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THE    CHILDREN    OF   GOOD    FORTUNE. 

An  Essay  in  Morals.     Crown  8vo,  ^1.30, 

net.     Postage  extra. 
JOHN    PERCYFIELD:    The  Anatomy  of 

Cheerfulness,     Crown  8vo,  $1.50. 

EDUCATION    AND    THE    LARGER     LIFE. 
Crown  8vo,  $1.30,  net.     Postpaid,  JS1.43. 

HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  &  COMPANY, 
Boston  and  New  York. 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  GOOD  FORTUNE 


THE  CHILDREN  OF 
GOOD  FORTUNE 

an  €^^ap  in  ^otal^ 

BY 

C.   HANFORD  HENDERSON 


**  Give  me  insight  into  to-day  and  you  may 
have  the  antique  and  future  worlds." 

Emerson. 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 

1905 


«'; 


2HEm: 


'^_  'Y/SSi 

Hi 


COPYRIGHT  1905  BY  C.  HANFORD  HENDERSON 
ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 

Published  Aprils  iqos 


dedication: 


TO  THOSE  GRACIOUS  SPIRITS  WHO 
IN  LIFE  AND  IN  LITERATURE  ARE 
HELPING  ME  TO  DISCOVER  IN  WHAT 
GOOD  FORTUNE  CONSISTS 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

I.  Prologue .  1 

II.  The  Problem 19 

III.  Human  Conduct 28 

IV.  Right  and  Wrong 43 

V.  Efficiency 63 

VI.  Worth 81 

VII.  The  Moral  Person 110 

VIII.   Individual  Morality 150 

IX.  The  Cardinal  Virtues 178 

X.  The  Doctrine  of  Automatic  Goodness       .  209 

XI.   Social  Welfare 241 

XII.  The  Morality  of  the  Four  Institutions  .  274 

Xni.  Occupations 328 

XIV.   Immediacy 368 

XV.  The  Moral  Outlook 388 


THE  CHILDEEK  OF 
GOOD  FORTUIS^E 


PROLOGUE 

THERE  are  two  galleries  in  Europe  which 
possess  a  charm  at  once  abiding  and  unique. 
One  of  these  is  the  room  of  the  portrait  busts 
in  the  Capitoline  Museum  at  Rome  ;  the  other  is 
the  gallery  of  artist-portraits  on  the  first  floor 
of  the  Uffizi  at  Florence. 

In  all  these  detained  faces,  —  the  marble  faces 
of  Roman  emperors  and  philosophers,  the  painted 
faces  of  the  master  artists  of  Europe,  —  it  is  pos- 
sible to  remark  some  characteristic  that  is  mod- 
ern and  contemporaneous.  Each  face  suggests  a 
human  quality  still  current.  Each  separate  fea- 
ture bespeaks  a  possibility  in  the  neighbor  or 
even  in  the  self.  It  is  not  the  technique  that 
interests  the  layman,  —  marvelous  as  the  tech- 
nique is,  —  it  is  this  abiding  human  nature. 

Each  portrait  shows  the  general  human  type, 
the  brows  and  eyes,  the  nose  and  chin,  the  lips 
and  cheeks,  and  all  the  rest  that  goes .  to  make 
up  the  human  face,  but  in  one  or  more  of  these 

1 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

common  features  there  is  an  emphasis  that  is 
unique,  a  subtle  something  which  transforms  the 
type  into  an  individual. 

Faces  that  lack  this  emphasis  lack  interest. 
The  too  perfect  faces  of  Greek  art  fail  in  any 
deep  sense  to  move  the  modern  world.  We  gaze 
upon  the  calm  face  of  the  Phoebus  Apollo,  or 
even  of  the  great  Zeus  himself,  with  a  calm  that 
is  almost  equal  to  theirs.  But  it  is  not  so  when 
we  turn  to  the  compassionate,  grief-smitten  face 
of  the  Man  of  Sorrows. 

It  is  this  emphasis,  this  distinguishing  stamp, 
which  determines  our  own  attitude  towards  the 
individual.  A  set  of  curves,  a  trick  of  light  and 
shade,  a  play  of  color,  a  unique  combination  of 
dimensions,  these  proclaim  a  human  quality  and 
serve  to  attract  or  repel.  Yet  they  are  things  so 
delicate,  so  elusive,  that  only  an  artist  can  seize 
them  and  make  them  permanent.  Where  the 
artist  is  a  master,  we  stand  in  a  gallery  of  naked 
souls.  In  Rome,  it  seems  hardly  credible  that 
the  spirit  of  the  first  Caesar  can  ever  have  quite 
escaped,  for  his  marble  face  so  holds  the  imagi- 
nation of  men.  Throughout  Italy  the  devotion 
of  Hadrian  confers  a  this-world  immortality  upon 
the  beautiful  Antinous. 

When  we  turn  from  these  admitted  portraits 
to  the  ideal  faces  which  people  with  excellence 
the  many  galleries  of  Europe,  we  read  the  same 

2 


PROLOGUE 


story.  There  is  the  same  running  scale  of  human 
possibility,  the  same  insistent  dwelling  upon  one 
particular  aspect.  As  we  follow  the  sweep  of 
time,  we  get  some  glimpse  of  the  major  contem- 
porary preference.  Only  here  and  there  does  one 
detect  a  timid  minority  report.  In  spite  of  the 
features  common  to  all,  the  anatomy  which  keeps 
them  true  to  the  species,  the  standard  of  beauty, 
or  excellence,  or  interest  is  evidently  a  very  shift- 
ing quality.  One  must  needs  have  considerable 
culture  to  be  appreciative  of  such  dissimilar  types. 
But  in  the  end,  if  the  study  has  been  fruitful,  one 
ceases  to  ask  that  tiresome  and  altogether  useless 
question  as  to  which  type  is  the  most  beautiful. 
One  discovers,  quite  without  asking,  which  type 
it  is  that  appeals  to  one's  own  deepest  and  most 
genuine  mood.  But  one  also  discovers,  and  this 
is  equally  educative,  that  in  the  world  at  large 
there  are  many  moods  of  undoubted  worth  and 
many  types  of  undoubted  beauty. 

Fortune  is  commonly  represented  by  a  woman's 
face.  When  her  smile  is  turned  towards  us,  we  call 
our  own  private  fortune  good.  We  all  desire  this 
smile,  this  good  fortune.  But  when  we  say  this, 
we  have  totally  different  things  in  mind.  Fortune 
is  well  symbolized  by  a  face,  for  she  has  as  many 
aspects  as  the  competing  faces  of  the  picture 
galleries.  Many  of  these  aspects  are  fair,  if  only 
one  had  the   sympathy  and  the   wit  to  search 

3 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTU-NE 

out  the  fairness.  But  it  requires  a  philosophic 
mood  to  seek  the  indeterminate  good.  The  quest 
is  generally  more  specific.  The  particular  good 
fortune  which  each  man  desires  is  like  that  one 
type  of  face  which  arouses  the  liveliest  satisfac- 
tion, and  appeals  to  the  deepest  and  most  genuine 
feeling.  Each  man  places  the  emphasis  for  him- 
self, and  so  makes  his  own  desired  good  fortune 
individual. 

The  good  fortune  which  my  neighbor  aspires 
to,  and  seems  to  have  almost  in  hand,  would  be 
so  intolerable  to  me  that  I  should  perhaps  be 
tempted  to  commit  suicide.  It  may  take  the  form 
of  a  smug  meat-shop,  with  marble-top  tables  and 
brass  weighing  machines  and  a  brisk  trade ;  and 
deep  down  in  his  heart  he  may  be  pitying  me  for 
desiring  less  solid  and  juicy  things.  Around  the 
corner  there  lives  a  man  of  genius  whose  good 
fortune,  it  may  be,  seems  to  me  so  altogether 
desirable  that  I  should  be  willing  to  face  instant 
death  if,  in  a  succeeding  incarnation,  I  might 
experience  a  like  beatitude. 

Fortune  has  such  very  different  and  such  very 
definite  messages  of  desire.  To  one  man  she 
means  houses  and  lands,  a  fat  bank  account,  or 
a  wealth  of  beautiful  objects.  To  another,  she 
means  home  and  children,  or  friendship  or  fame. 
To  a  third,  it  may  be  of&cial  position,  or  great 
learning,  or  the   artist-power,  or  saintliness,  or 

4 


PROLOGUE 


some  other  form  of  personal  possession.  To  the 
sick,  good  fortune  may  mean  the  slightest  touch 
of  returning  health ;  to  the  poor,  the  mere  absence 
of  immediate  want.  It  is  seldom  good  fortune 
in  general.  It  is  nearly  always  good  fortune  in 
particular.  Even  the  traditional  youth,  who  starts 
out  to  seek  his  fortunes  in  the  traditional  story- 
book, is  after  a  definite  end,  however  vague  may 
be  his  ideas  in  regard  to  means.  He  wants  the 
beautiful  princess,  and  the  smiling  kingdom,  and 
the  well-filled  treasure-house.  And  unless  he 
find  them,  no  healthy-minded  child  will  be  satis- 
fied with  the  tale,  whatever  the  professed  senti- 
ments of  the  youth  himself. 

Good  fortune,  to  be  genuine,  must  be  indi- 
vidual, and  this  both  in  the  quest  itself  and  in 
the  thing  sought. 

On  the  whole,  imitation  is  a  poor  thing,  either 
in  art  or  in  life.  The  artist  who  copies,  even 
though  he  copy  masterpieces,  gets  a  journeyman's 
reward.  His  proper  craft  is  to  create  new  master- 
pieces. So  in  life,  it  is  the  man  who  grasps  the 
needs  of  the  present  hour,  who  reaHzes  that  life 
is  an  on-rushing,  dynamic  thing  to  be  freshly 
reported  by  each  new  beholder,  it  is  this  man 
who  renders  faithful  service.  And  he  is  a  master 
craftsman  indeed  who  under  .his  modern  symbol 
can  preserve  and  include  the  loveliness  of  the 
past.    The  modern    knight  of  good  fortune  is 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

under  the  same  necessity,  the  necessity  of  con- 
serving the  gains  of  the  past,  and  at  the  same 
time  of  advancing  the  quest.  With  the  world  as 
old  as  it  is,  and  human  experience  as  deep  as  it 
is,  one  must  count  it  a  rather  shabby  and  com- 
monplace thing  to  fix  one's  heart  upon  any  of 
those  old-time  goals  which  to  modern  eyes  are 
properly  discredited.  We  may  readily  grant  that 
in  each  of  the  ideals  thus  given  over  as  a  whole 
there  is  some  element  of  substantial  value  quite 
worth  the  keeping,  something  that  made  them 
a  once  priceless  lesson.  But  to  elect  these  unre- 
vised  plans  of  the  past,  to  lay  hold  of  some  static 
scheme  of  life,  is  to  lose  the  major  good  of  Hving. 
It  is  easily  conceivable  that  those  who  do  this 
should  feel  an  intolerable  ennui  before  the  game 
is  played  out,  for  the  game  has  ceased  to  be  sig- 
nificant. Life,  just  bare  life  itself,  without  initi- 
ative and  novelty,  without  the  sense  of  on-rush 
and  progress,  is  not  entirely  worth  while.  To  be 
good,  life  must  be  full-blooded  and  at  first  hand, 
a  stirring,  personal  adventure  which  engages  all 
one's  interest  and  resource,  and  leads  to  some 
goal  at  once  desirable  and  desired. 

To  say  this  is  to  say  that  the  good  life,  the 
life  which  represents  good  fortune,  is  essentially 
dynamic,  an  affair  of  the  present  moment,  an 
affair  of  to-day,  not  a  reflection  of  yesterday, 
not  an  anticipation  of  to-morrow.    There  must 

6 


PROLOGUE 


be  nothing  belated  about  it,  nothing  outworn, 
nothing  discredited.  The  good  life  is  vital,  pal- 
pitating, immediate. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  always  that  good  for- 
tune is  a  personal  possession,  an  affair  of  con- 
sciousness, and  that  this  holds  true  in  whatever 
good  fortune  be  made  to  consist.  The  miser 
who  believes  his  money  stolen  when  in  reality  it 
is  only  misplaced,  counts  himself  poor.  The  so- 
cial worker  who  sows  the  best  of  seed  and  yet 
fails  to  come  personally  into  the  harvest,  counts 
himself  defeated.  An  unexpected  windfall  so 
heightens  the  idea  of  wealth  that  the  windfall 
itself  is  commonly  spent  several  times  over.  In  a 
word,  good  fortune  is  a  very  primitive  thing.  It 
is  a  feeling,  —  the  feeling  we  have  about  our- 
selves and  our  performances  and  our  properties, 
—  and  fluctuates  quite  as  violently  as  the  feelings 
will.  A  favorable  looking-glass,  a  becoming  suit 
of  clothes,  an  auspicious  rumor  in  the  market,  a 
word  of  genuine  praise,  a  friendly  conference, 
even  a  comforting  dinner,  and  the  erstwhile 
unfortunate  man  believes  himself  favored  of  the 
gods. 

Good  fortune,  to  the  possessor  of  it,  is  very 
real,  even  though  from  an  outside  point  of  view 
it  be  made  of  the  veriest  stuff  that  dreams  are 
made  of.  Colonel  Sellers,  dilating  on  his  pros- 
pective wealth,  has  all  the  expansive  feelings  of 

7 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

a  veritable  millionaire.  The  Indian  adept,  pos- 
sessed only  of  loin-cloth  and  begging-bowl,  and 
parted  from  the  material  world  as  far  as  mystical 
contemplation  can  do  it,  believes  himself  on  the 
road  to  high  good  fortune.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
good  fortune  is  an  experience.  The  cause  may 
be  slender  enough,  but  the  feeling  is  genuine. 

While  this  subjective  aspect  of  good  fortune 
has  its  trivial  and  amusing  side,  —  and  one  may 
often  see  it  in  one's  self,  —  it  is  an  aspect  that 
must  be  reckoned  with  practically.  The  effort 
to  hearten  a  man  up  may  spring  from  no  more 
serious  motive  than  an  amiable  desire  to  make 
him  feel  comfortable,  and  yet  be  productive  of 
really  substantial  good.  In  our  own  day,  opti- 
mism has  been  erected  into  a  cult,  and  has  set 
thousands  of  people  seeking  a  good  fortune 
which,  to  the  onlooker  at  least,  must  seem  highly 
hypothetical.  And  yet,  in  spite  of  the  crudeness 
and  ovei>statement  which  characterize  perhaps 
the  majority  of  these  movements,  it  can  hardly 
be  doubted  that,  taken  as  a  whole,  they  have 
made  the  world  a  sunnier  and  better  place  to  live 
in,  and  have  thus  been  a  genuine  contribution 
to  social  welfare.  On  the  other  hand,  to  believe 
that  the  battle  is  constantly  going  against  you 
is  to  force  it  to  go  against  you  in  the  end.  For 
this  reason,  pessimists  are  seldom  converted.  An 
initial  pessimism  becomes  valid  occasion  for  fresh 

8 


PROLOGUE 


pessimism.  It  is  a  classical  instance,  that  of  the 
well  man  made  genuinely  ill  by  having  a  dozen 
friends  drop  in  upon  him  the  same  day  and  sep- 
arately comment  upon  how  poorly  he  is  looking. 

But  a  man's  beliefs,  whether  influenced  in 
this  casual  fashion  by  a  passing  suggestion,  or 
shaped  by  a  larger  and  more  compelling  fate, 
are  the  effective  motive-power  in  the  human 
drama.  There  are  valid  objective  standards  by 
which  the  success  of  a  life  may  be  weighed  and 
measured.  They  are  standards  which  one  man 
may  apply  to  another  man,  the  historian  to  his 
statesmen  and  generals,  the  biographer  to  his 
hero,  the  moralist  to  his  hypothetical  men  and 
women ;  but  these  standards  have  no  influence 
whatever  upon  the  attainment  of  success,  unless 
they  be  accepted  by  the  man  himself,  the  actor, 
and  sincerely  incorporated  into  his  own  concep- 
tion of  success. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  a  saint,  the  business 
man  is  a  failure,  no  matter  how  many  millions 
he  may  accumulate.  From  the  point  of  view  of 
a  commercialist,  the  saint  is  a  failure,  no  mat- 
ter hoW  saintly  he  may  become.  These  truths 
are  unpardonably  obvious,  but  they  are  worth 
repeating,  for  they  are  so  easily  overlooked.  It 
was  Mr.  Mill  who  remarked  that  some  platitudes 
are  luminous. 

If  a  man  believes  that  he  has  succeeded,  that 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

he  has  attained  good  fortune,  he  will  naturally 
rest  just  there ;  and  in  point  of  fact,  he  would 
be  a  very  foolish  and  unreasonable  person  if  he 
failed  to  do  so.  It  is  true  that  the  greater  good 
fortune  may  come  when  he  realizes  that  he  is 
mistaken,  when  he  sets  out,  like  Paracelsus,  to 
seek  a  second  and  a  greater  good.  But,  however 
he  came  by  it,  it  must  be  his  own  ideal  of  good 
fortune.  The  good  fortune  must  seem  to  him 
worth  while.  It  must  seem  to  him  at  least  in 
part  attainable.  It  must  be  the  thing  that  he 
would  most  like  to  possess.  For  no  man  can  fol- 
low a  light  which  he  does  not  see.  It  is  as  use- 
less as  it  is  lacking  in  good  taste  to  try  to  bully 
a  man,  either  intellectually  or  spiritually,  into 
seeking  a  good  fortune  which  he  does  not  be- 
lieve in,  does  not  want,  and  would  not  value.  It 
is  like  expecting  an  animal  to  drink  when  it  is 
not  thirsty.  Of  necessity,  each  soul  sets  up  its 
own  goal,  and  satisfies  itself  that  the  goal  is 
being  reached. 

The  tragedy  of  life  comes  in  large  part  from 
the  persistent  attempt  to  force  our  own  ideas  of 
good  fortune  down  our  neighbor's  throat".  The 
pathos  of  life  comes  in  large  part  from  his  too 
amiable  comphance,  his  vain  attempt  to  follow 
a  light  which  he  does  not  see.  If  we  ourselves 
have  found  the  light,  or  believe  that  we  have, 
let  us  by  all  means  try  to  reveal  it  to  our  brother. 

10 


PROLOGUE 


If  he  share  our  confidence  in  believing  that  we 
have  a  light  not  yet  perceived  by  him,  let  him 
by  all  means  try  to  catch  sight  of  the  beatific 
vision.  But,  meanwhile,  let  us  be  ourselves,  both 
me  and  my  brother,  the  sincere  followers  of  such 
light  as  we  genuinely  have. 

This  quest  of  good  fortune,  however  dimly  it 
may  be  perceived,  however  falteringly  it  may 
be  followed,  is  in  effect  the  significant  part  of 
human  life.  It  is  a  quest  on  which  all  embark ;  in 
which  all  have  some  slight  measure  of  success ; 
in  which  some  have  large  measure ;  in  which  a 
very  few  have  full  measure.  Yet,  apparently,  the 
same  methods  are  open  to  all.  Jhe  drama  of  life 
is  a  process  in  which  character,  the  inner  part 
of  a  man,  expresses  itself  in  conduct,  the  outer 
part  of  him.  If  character  were  a  fixed  quantity, 
it  would  be  able  in  the  end  to  express  itself  quite 
perfectly  in  conduct,  and  the  heart's  desire  would 
be  an  achieved  fact.  But  the  problem  is  not 
so  simple.  It  is  not  made  up  of  fixed,  determi- 
nate quantities,  like  an  easy  sum  in  arithmetic. 
Rather,  it  is  like  one  of  those  fascinating  prob- 
lems in  the  calculus,. where  we  study  the  relation 
between  quantities  which  are  themselves  variable. 

For  myself,  I  do  not  regret  that  the  problem 
of  life  is  so  involved.  I  rejoice  that  it  is  a  prob- 
lem of  such  many-sided,  inextinguishable  inter- 
est.   It  is  the  more  worth  while,  and  gives  ample 

11 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

reassurance  that  life  will  never  become  the  tra- 
ditional sucked  orange,  —  a  poor  thing,  to  be 
thrown  away  quite  without  regret.  The  attempt 
to  solve  the  problem  of  life  once  for  all  and 
have  done  with  the  problem  is  responsible  for 
most,  if  not  all,  of  the  ennui  of  life.  In  reality, 
there  is  no  static  solution,  no  hard-and-fast  an- 
swer, like  the  answers  to  be  found  in  the  key 
to  an  arithmetic.  Life  is  not  a  tableau,  even  a 
tableau  vivant ;  it  is  a  drama. 

But  even  as  a  drama,  life  would  fail  of  per- 
manent interest  if  it  failed  to  be  broadly  intel- 
ligible. It  is  a  useless,  impertinent  question  to  ask 
the  full  meaning  of  life,  when  all  we  experience 
of  life  is  a  mere  fragment.  But  the  conviction 
deepens,  the  more  we  study  this  fragment,  that 
we  can  at  least  discover  something  of  its  quality. 
The  joy  of  following  a  series  of  ideals,  however 
lofty  and  beautiful,  would  soon  be  given  over, 
if  one  ideal  after  another  were  abandoned  and 
a  new  and  unrelated  one  put  up  in  its  place. 
There  are  few  hearts  so  stout  as  to  withstand  this 
incoherence.  Existence  would  be  a  meaningless 
process,  a  mere  following  of  some  transitory  will- 
o'-the-wisp.  There  are,  indeed,  lives  which  seem, 
from  the  outside  at  least,  to  display  just  this  lack 
of  meaning  and  effect.  They  are  Hves  in  which 
the  idea  of  good  fortune  changes  so  frequently 
and  so  radically  that  conduct  hardly  begins  to 

12 


PROLOGUE 


adjust  itself  to  character,  and  nothing  quite  worth 
while  is  ever  achieved. 

Failure  to  attain  the  reasonable  ends  of  Hfe  is 
not  so  common  or  so  inevitable  as  is  generally 
supposed.  What  does  happen  is,  that  the  ends 
are  changed  before  the  old  hne  of  conduct  has 
come  to  its  proper  harvest.  Men  who  have 
achieved  their  ends,  men  like  Edison,  for  exam- 
ple, are  quite  outspoken  in  af&rming  that  the 
secret  is  not  so  much  genius  as  concentration. 
A  character  that  is  too  volatile  has  no  adequate 
chance  to  express  itself  in  conduct.  Men  may 
suffer  quite  as  much  from  an  excess  of  ideals, 
a  confusion  of  them,  as  from  a  deficiency  of 
ideals. 

It  is  almost  literally  true  that  all  comes  around 
to  him  who  will  but  wait,  —  if  by  waiting  one 
means  steadfastness  to  a  fixed  idea.  But,  as  I 
have  been  trying  to  suggest,  these  ideas  depend 
for  their  value  upon  their  relation  to  one  another, 
and  upon  their  significance  in  the  whole  scheme 
of  life.  If  they  lack  unity  and  meaning,  they 
may  express  themselves  adequately  in  conduct 
and  yet  give  us  nothing  more  impressive  than  a 
series  of  childish  exploits,  —  a  full  harvest,  but 
without  much  value.  The  major  inquiry  for 
those  who  wish  to  live  a  life  of  serious  beauty  is, 
what  sort  of  an  ideal  will  be  progressively  and 
permanently  satisfying ;  and  what  sort  of  con- 

13 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

duct  will  continuously  adjust  itself  to  the  attain- 
ment of  this  ideal  ? 

I  am  here  embarking  upon  such  an  inquiry. 
I  have  called  my  venture  The  Children  of 
Good  Fortune,  in  the  belief  that  this  expresses 
the  purpose  and  the  destiny  of  mankind.  For 
whether  our  lives  be  admirable  or  wretched,  we 
are  all  of  us  reaching  out  after  a  good  fortune 
such  as  we  see.  We  are  all  children  of  the  same 
great  earth-mother,  all  bent  on  satisfying  the 
heart's  desire.  We  differ  from  one  another 
mainly  in  our  conception  of  what  good  fortune 
really  is,  and  in  the  efficiency  of  the  methods  we 
employ  in  trying  to  compass  it.  But  for  all  of 
us,  the  quest  is  inevitable.  It  is,  as  I  have  said, 
the  significant  thing  in  human  life.  And  no 
human  life  is  wholly  devoid  of  significance,  for 
no  man  wholly  escapes  the  universal  seeking. 

So  far,  such  an  inquiry  might  be  merely  one 
of  worldly  prudence,  the  reaching  out  after  suc- 
cess, quite  regardless  of  what  success  is  made  to 
consist  in,  provided  only  it  kept  the  adventurer 
himself  contented  and  happy.  But  even  so  bare 
a  quest  would  not  be  devoid  of  moral  value. 
Any  definite  plan  and  purpose  is  better  than 
what  some  one  has  called  '  a  mere  succession  of 
unorganized  and  unrelated  acts  and  sensations,' 
for  in  the  end  it  brings  a  discipline  which  is 
both  self -regarding  and  other-regarding.    Indeed, 

14 


PROLOGUE 


Hobbes  and  the  early  English  moralists  made 
self-preservation  the  touchstone  of  their  systems  ; 
and  this  prudence  was  simply  enlarged  and  made 
social  when  Lord  Shaftesbury  amended  it  to  mean 
preservation  of  the  species.  But  while  every 
quest  of  good  fortune  involves  as  much  as  this, 
involves  self-preservation  as  a  necessary  condi- 
tion of  attainment,  the  deepest  interest  of  the 
student  and  practitioner  of  morals  is  enlisted 
only  when  he  can  sympathize  quite  as  genuinely 
with  the  worth  of  the  good  fortune  sought  as 
with  the  efficiency  and  success  of  the  quest  it- 
self. And  sometimes,  as  we  all  know,  the  highest 
good  fortune  results  from  a  line  of  conduct 
which  to  smaller  souls  appears  to  throw  prudence 
completely  to  the  winds. 

We  have  here  a  situation  which  is  both  inter- 
esting and  puzzling.  Good  fortune  has  many 
aspects,  quite  as  many  aspects  as  the  human  face 
itself.  Furthermore,  it  is  an  individual  experi- 
ence, is  private  and  subjective.  Each  man  who 
goes  on  the  quest  —  and  we  all  go  —  must  set 
up  his  own  goal,  must  believe  in  it,  must  choose 
his  own  methods  for  reaching  it.  And  this,  as 
he  is  an  honest  man,  he  is  quite  bound  to  do, 
whether  his  neighbor  approve  or  disapprove.  In 
a  large  sense,  every  man  must  be  a  law  unto  him- 
self, since  he  must  obey  that  law  whose  authority 
he  accepts.    But  morality  is  a  judgment  which 

15 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

must  include  both  the  man  and  the  neighbor. 
It  is  obHged  to  look  at  the  matter  from  a  less 
personal  standpoint,  and  to  apply  a  more  objec- 
tive and  less  individual  measuring-rod.  Morality 
must  consider  both  the  individual  idea  and  the 
world  idea,  since  its  province  is  to  know  quite 
beyond  peradventure  whether  the  fortune  is 
good  and  the  quest  is  successful.  It  is  the  high 
province  of  morality  to  discover  in  what  genuine 
good  fortune  consists,  and  to  point  out  the  con- 
ditions under  which  it  may  be  realized. 

Much  of  the  confusion  and  uncertainty  in  the 
current  theory  of  morals  and  the  current  prac- 
tice is  due  to  this  double  aspect  of  the  question, 
this  necessity  of  bringing  forward  a  standard 
which  shall  be  individual  and  subjective  on  the 
one  hand,  and  universal  and  objective  on  the 
other.  In  particular,  this  double  aspect  is  re- 
sponsible for  the  quarrel,  now  over  twenty  cen- 
turies old,  between  those  moralists  who  hold  that 
pleasure,  or  happiness,  is  the  highest  good,  the 
summum  honum,  and  those  other  moralists  who 
hold  that  the  highest  good  lies  in  conformity  to 
an  outer,  objective  standard.  Taken  separately, 
neither  party  to  the  controversy  is  right ;  taken 
together,  they  are  both  right. 

The  considerations  to  be  brought  forward  in 
the  present  volume  are  permeated  by  the  convic- 
tion that  there  is  no  real  conflict  between  indi- 

16 


PROLOGUE 


vidual  happiness  and  social  welfare.  It  will  be 
pointed  out  that  there  is  an  essential  conflict  be- 
tween false  ideas  of  individual  happiness  and 
a  genuine  social  welfare ;  and  it  will  further  be 
pointed  out  that  there  is  an  equally  essential  con- 
flict between  a  genuine  individual  happiness  and 
false  ideas  of  social  welfare.  It  will  be  held  — 
and  I  hope  successfully  —  that  happiness  in  the 
deepest  and  truest  sense  of  the  word  is  real- 
ized only  by  conduct  which  is  objectively  and 
socially  acceptable ;  and  quite  as  steadfastly  will 
it  be  held  that  no  outwardly  imposed  standard  of 
conduct  is  valid  which  does  not  lead  in  the  end 
to  personal,  individual  happiness.  It  is  difficult 
to  believe  that  a  collection  of  separate  units  can 
possess  qualities  not  possessed  by  the  individual 
units,  and  equally  difficult  to  believe  that  the 
good  fortune  of  a  community  can  be  made  up  of 
anything  less  real  than  the  good  fortune  of  indi- 
viduals. 

These  considerations  do  not  solve  the  diffi- 
culty. Perhaps  they  even  emphasize  it.  But 
just  as  a  knotty  problem  in  mathematics  is  far 
more  attractive  than  every-day  sums,  so  this  most 
difficult  of  human  problems  —  What  is  right?  — 
has  always  had  great  fascination  for  the  thinkers 
of  all  ages.  It  has  pleased  the  more  abstract  of 
them  to  inquire  in  what  good  fortune  consists, 
even  where  they  have  not  personally  tried  to 

17 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

grasp  it.  Frankly,  this  is  not  the  way  the  prob- 
lem is  to  be  solved.  Good  fortune  is  an  experi- 
ence, not  an  abstraction.  Only  those  who  live 
can  say  anything  very  helpful  about  life.  One 
must  needs  be  a  practitioner  of  morals,  as  well 
as  a  student,  in  order  to  gain  the  larger  insight. 
My  own  sympathies  are  wholly  with  those  who 
go  on  the  quest ;  not  with  St.  Simon  Stylites  on 
top  of  his  pillar,  type  of  those  who  renounce  life, 
but  with  the  men  down  in  the  heat  and  dust  of 
the  plain,  who  accept  life  in  all  its  exuberance 
and  many-sidedness,  and  try  to  make  it  good. 

It  is  needless  to  say  that  such  an  essay  as  this 
is  not  meant  for  the  technical  moralist.  While 
I  should  feel  honored  by  his  company,  I  am  not 
at  all  sure  that  he  would  find  the  following 
pages  to  his  taste.  They  are  wholly  untechnical. 
They  are  addressed  to  those  earnest  men  and 
women  who  are  struggling  with  the  problems  of 
morality,  not  with  a  view  to  gathering  them  into 
a  system,  but  rather  with  a  view  to  putting  them 
into  practice,  the  men  and  women  who  are  try- 
ing to  import  into  the  daily  affairs  of  life  an 
atmosphere  of  serious  and  abiding  beauty. 


II 

THE  PROBLEM 

IT  is  a  very  old  question,  this  question  of  right 
and  wrong,  and  so  many  wise  men  and  so 
many  fooHsh  men  have  been  working  away  at  it 
during  the  centuries  that  one  might  think  the  last 
word  had  long  since  been  spoken,  and  perhaps 
forgotten.  But  the  problem  is  eternally  new 
and  eternally  unsolved.  For  men  are  constantly 
eating  of  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  good  and 
evil.  The  problem  is  no  sooner  stated  and  partly 
solved  by  one  generation  than  it  must  be  re-stated 
and  re-solved  by  another  generation. 

This  refusal  of  the  problem  to  be  stated  and 
solved,  once  for  all,  comes  about  from  the  fact 
that  right  and  wrong  can  no  longer  be  written 
down  as  absolute  terms,  but  must  be  counted 
purely  relative.  Right  and  wrong  change  their 
significance,  as  all  words  do,  in  harmony  with 
the  growing  intelligence  of  the  race. 

What  was  wholly  right  once  is  probably 
wholly  right  always.  But  it  has  not  been  given 
to  man  to  see  the  wholly  right.  How  blind  he 
is  in  matters  of  morality  can  perhaps  be  better 
appreciated  by  observing  his  parallel  blindness 

19 


THE    CHILDREN   OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

in  the  more  obvious  world  of  brick  and  stone. 
With  all  their  courage  and  insight,  the  founders 
of  our  own  Republic  could  draw  no  picture  of 
what  it  would  be  in  the  present  year  of  grace. 
They  had  to  deal  with  a  totally  different  material 
world,  with  a  world  devoid  of  coal,  railways, 
steamships,  dynamos,  telegraphs,  ocean  cables, 
telephones,  electric  lights,  automobiles,  a  world 
without  abundant  iron  and  steel  and  copper, 
without  our  revolutionizing  machinery.  Nor 
could  they  even  foresee  these  new  elements,  for 
they  had  no  finger-posts  to  point  the  direction. 
Were  we  of  to-day  to  attempt  a  picture  of  the 
world  of  a  century  hence,  we  should  produce 
something  too  feeble  to  be  called  even  a  carica- 
ture. The  passenger  elevator  is  a  simple  matter, 
but  it  has  made  a  complete  change  in  our  city 
architecture.  The  railroad  is  a  comparatively 
simple  matter,  but  it  has  created  an  altogether 
new  distribution  of  population,  and  has  brought 
about  a  new  habit  of  national  life.  The  century 
to  come  is  filled  with  just  such  a  complexity  of 
possibilities,  but  we  can  foresee  practically  none 
of  them. 

In  the  more  subtle  and  plastic  world  of  the 
spirit,  we  are  meeting  equally  radical  discoveries 
and  inventions,  passing  out  of  old  conceptions 
of  human  relations  into  totally  new  ones,  adding 
ideas,  changing,  supplanting,  suppressing,  until 

20 


THE   PROBLEM 


we  find  ourselves  in  a  moral  world  so  novel  and 
so  spacious  that  no  earlier  generation  could 
have  either  foreseen  it  or  provided  for  its  needs. 
Were  we  disposed  to  turn  prophet  and  try  our 
hand  at  forecasting  the  morality  of  the  future,  we 
should  doubtless  go  as  wide  of  the  mark  as  in  our 
clumsy  attempts  to  picture  the  outward  aspects  of 
the  coming  civilization. 

In  his  moral  life,  man  has  had  to  deal  all 
along  with  the  partially  right,  or,  more  perplex- 
ing still,  with  what  was  considered  right.  Had 
there  been  some  available  touchstone  for  right 
and  wrong,  a  standard  quite  beyond  question,  it 
would  have  been  an  easy  matter  to  escape  con- 
fusion in  both  theory  and  practice.  It  would 
have  made  the  game  of  human  life  less  interest- 
ing, but  far  surer.  The  one  wisdom  had  been  a 
knowledge  of  the  perfect  code ;  the  one  virtue, 
obedience  to  the  code. 

But  we  know  very  well  that  this  is  not  the 
case.  We  know  that  right  and  wrong,  as  we 
iinderstand  the  terms,  are  purely  matters  of 
human  opinion,  —  grotesque  enough,  where  opin- 
ion is  crude  and  uninformed ;  touched  with  the 
sublime,  where  the  opinion  is  chastened  and 
rationalized.  In  the  individual,  opinion  is  fluid 
up  to  forty,  let  us  say.  In  the  community,  opin- 
ion has  its  periods  of  arrest,  its  dogmatic  slumber, 
followed  by  periods  of   plasticity  and  spiritual 

21 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

on-rush.     We    have   the   Dark   Ages   and   the 
Renaissance. 

To  know  what  is  wholly  right,  this  would  turn 
us  men  into  gods.  But  even  as  men  we  may 
believe  that  there  is  a  wholly  right;  we  may 
believe  in  a  scheme  of  absolute  morals,  a  rule 
of  life  which  would  commend  itself  to  gods  and 
men  alike.  Such  a  system  would  be  made  up  of 
necessary  truths.  It  would  be  capable  of  just  as 
exact  and  formal  statement  as  the  propositions 
of  geometry.  It  would  indeed  be  a  branch  of 
exact  science,  and  open  to  rigid  demonstration. 
It  is  possible,  and  perhaps  even  helpful,  to  con- 
ceive that  there  is  such  a  system,  but  it  is  need- 
ful to  bear  always  in  mind  that  if  there  be,  it 
exists  only  in  the  empyrean  above  us,  in  that 
absolute  world  of  which  no  traveler  has  brought 
us  charts.  Human  experience  makes  us  recog- 
nize that  we  ourselves  live  in  a  world  of  moving 
moralities,  a  dynamic  world.  If  we  are  so  con- 
stituted, we  may  find  rest  and  courage  in  the 
thought  that  somewhere  there  is  a  moral  equi- 
librium, a  static  world  of  complete  attainment. 
The  conception  is  helpful  to  this  extent,  that  it 
enables  us  to  picture  the  moral  life  as  an  unend- 
ing path  leading  from  however  unpromising  a 
present  into  however  gratifying  a  future.  It 
makes  the  quest  of  good  fortune  what  the  human 
heart  makes  it,  a  game  never  quite  played  out. 

22 


THE    PROBLEM 


It  is  even  conceivable  that  the  gods  themselves 
have  not  yet  reached  the  ultimate  goal,  the  high- 
est good,  for  in  one  sense  to  attain  everything 
would  be  to  lose  everything.  It  may  well  be  that 
the  game  is  never  closed,  that  progress  is  the 
eternal  stimulant  to  the  celestial  hosts  as  well  as 
to  the  denizens  of  earth. 

This  conception  of  an  absolute  though  inac- 
cessible right  is  also  helpful  in  enabling  us  to 
picture  a  multitude  of  individual  souls  moving 
on  the  same  path,  the  path  from  nothingness  to 
God,  traveling  at  different  stages  and  unequal 
rates,  but  all  with  faces  turned  towards  the  same 
light.  So  I  may  pass  my  more  sluggish  brother, 
to  be  left  behind  in  turn  by  the  one  who  is 
more  alert. 

One  obvious  danger  in  such  a  conception  of 
absolute  values  is  that  we  may  sometimes  make 
the  grave  mistake  of  supposing  that  we  ourselves 
have  got  hold  of  very  truth,  the  wholly  right, 
and  in  our  enthusiasm,  may  be  for  forcing  the 
precious  gift  upon  our  unwilhng  neighbor,  quite 
forgetting  that  he,  too,  has  his  visions,  perhaps 
not  so  wide  as  ours,  perhaps  infinitely  wider. 
Such  an  attitude  of  compulsion  is  full  of  mischief, 
but  happily  it  is  not  permanently  possible.  Sooner 
or  later,  human  experience  brings  human  toler- 
ation. 

The  Right  and  Wrong  with  which  mankind 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

has  daily  to  deal  are  fluid  terms  whose  content 
deepens  as  life  itself  deepens.  If  one  has  been 
accustomed  to  think  of  them  as  absolute  terms, 
even  in  human  affairs,  this  conception  of  their 
relativity  may  seem  at  first  sight  quite  to  rob 
them  of  authority,  and  to  be  on  that  account 
wholly  unwelcome.  But  as  one  entertains  the 
conception  and  explores  its  implications,  one  be- 
gins to  realize  that  this  very  fluidity  is  a  source 
of  compelling  power.  Not  only  does  this  infinite 
possibility  of  growth  convey  a  vitality  and  abid- 
ing interest  to  life  which  nothing  else  can,  but 
one  becomes  more  sensitive  to  right  and  wrong 
when  one  perceives  that  in  reality  right  is  some- 
thing more  august  than  it  at  first  appears,  and 
wrong  something  more  hideous. 

Right  being  the  desirable  thing,  and  wrong  the 
undesirable  thing,  the  history  of  human  endeavor 
is  the  search,  however  blind,  to  know  the  right 
and  follow  it.  Saints  and  sinners  are  on  the  same 
eternal  quest,  and  the  line  between  them  is  not 
so  hard-and-fast  as  we  sometimes  think.  There 
are  few  saints  wholly  free  from  sin,  and  few  sin- 
ners wholly  devoid  of  saintliness.  The  main  dif- 
ference between  them  is  the  degree  in  which  the 
subjective  ideal  of  the  desirable  coincides  with 
the  objective  ideal  of  the  right.  Using  right  in 
its  relative  human  sense,  it  need  create  no  confu- 
sion of  moral  values  to  point  out  that  if  the 

24 


THE    PROBLEM 


objective  ideal  of  right  is  in  effect  wrong,  the 
so-called  saint  may  be  the  real  sinner,  and  the 
so-called  sinner,  the  real  saint.  If  right  be  used 
in  the  absolute  sense,  it  is  salutary  to  remem- 
ber that  the  divergence  of  both  ideals  from  the 
supreme  standard  leaves  saint  and  sinner  near 
kinsmen.  It  is  the  partial  vision,  the  fragmen- 
tary knowledge,  that  makes  the  saint  what  he  is, 
and  the  sinner  what  he  is.  If  both  were  infinitely 
wise,  both  would  be  infinitely  good.  The  problem 
of  right  and  wrong,  the  old  problem  of  good  and 
evil,  is  essentially  the  problem  of  Knowledge  and 
Ignorance.  So  it  appeared  to  Socrates,  and  so  it 
appears  to  the  men  of  the  Renaissance.  During 
the  Middle  Ages,  the  problem  was  obscured,  but 
nevertheless  the  human  heart  went  on  solving  it. 
The  subjective  ideal  of  the  desirable  is  what 
we  have  called  the  idea  of  Good  Fortune  ;  and 
the  objective  ideal,  what  we  have  called  the  idea 
of  Social  Welfare,  In  a  very  few  average  individ- 
uals, the  two  ideals  may  pretty  nearly  coincide, 
but  in  the  majority,  there  is  some  divergence. 
Society  at  large  has  always  been  intolerant  of 
any  wide  divergence,  and  quite  as  intolerant  of  a 
divergence  above  her  own  standard  as  below  it. 
She  has  been  almost  as  ready  to  crucify  her  pro- 
phets as  she  has  her  malefactors.  The  problem 
of  morality  is  to  bring  these  two  ideals  into  har- 
mony, not,  as  is  too  often  taken  for  granted,  by 


^"?.^^i.>. 


OF 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

making  the  subjective  ideal  conform  wholly  to 
the  objective  ideal,  but  rather  by  permitting  the 
two  ideals  to  react  on  each  other,  and  so  produce 
a  standard  more  catholic  and  authoritative  than 
either. 

By  its  very  nature,  character  is  essentially  a 
private  and  subjective  possession.  It  is  influenced, 
and  most  powerfully,  by  the  surrounding  social 
atmosphere,  but  by  no  outward  force  can  it  suffer 
violent  dislocation.  But  character  is  constantly 
expressing  itself  in  conduct ;  and  in  all  civilized 
communities,  conduct,  for  both  moral  and  admin- 
istrative reasons,  must  be  constantly  chastened 
by  the  standard  of  social  welfare.  The  quest  of 
good  fortune  thus  becomes  on  its  theoretical  side 
the  study  of  morality,  a  study  which  has  to  do 
with  human  conduct,  and  with  that  aspect  of 
human  conduct  which  is  good.  The  quest,  theo- 
retically, is  the  science  of  good  conduct ;  prac- 
tically, it  is  the  art  of  right  living.  A  man's 
character  may  be  pretty  clearly  known  to  himself, 
—  though  generally  it  is  not,  —  but  to  his  neigh- 
bors it  is  merely  an  induction  from  his  observed 
conduct.  They  estimate  conduct  by  the  worth 
of  its  goal,  and  by  its  ef&ciency  in  reaching  the 
goal.  These  judgments  are  sound  morally  only 
as  they  are  discriminating,  as  they  recognize  what 
conduct  is,  and  what  right  is. 

It  seems,  then,  that  morals  has  a  double  con- 

26 


THE    PROBLEM 


cern,  —  it  has  to  inquire  what  part  of  human 
activity  may  properly  be  classed  as  conduct ;  and 
this  determined,  it  must  investigate  in  what  the 
quality  of  goodness,  as  applied  to  conduct,  con- 
sists. These  two  are  indeed  the  basal  questions 
of  morality,  —  What  is  conduct  ?  What  makes 
it  right  or  wrong  ?  —  and  here  we  have  a  plain 
statement  of  our  Problem. 


Ill 

HUMAN  CONDUCT 

OPINION,  and  by  this  I  mean  informed  opin- 
ion, differs  as  to  how  much  of  human 
action  may  be  counted  as  conduct,  and  how  much 
must  be  set  down  as  simple  bodily  activity.  Our 
opinion  on  such  a  matter  very  naturally  depends 
upon  the  view  we  hold  regarding  the  relation 
between  life  and  mind.  So  long  as  these  views 
differ,  and  they  will  probably  differ  for  a  long 
time  to  come,  there  must  be  corresponding  dif- 
ferences in  our  estimates  of  the  extension  of 
human  conduct. 

In  a  general  way  we  may  define  conduct  as 
human  activity  which  involves  a  purpose.  It  is 
the  adjustment  of  means  to  ends.  We  shall  be 
getting  at  the  subject-matter  of  morals  if  we 
eliminate  from  human  activity  all  movement 
which  is  without  purpose,  and  which  involves  no 
such  adjustment.  But  this  at  once  brings  up 
the  question  as  to  whether  there  are  any  such 
activities  as  these  to  be  eliminated,  and  we  find 
ourselves  at  a  fork  in  the  road. 

Organically  speaking,  loss  of  function  means 
sooner  or  later  a  loss  of  organ.    As  soon  as  an 

28 


HUMAN    CONDUCT 


organ  ceases  to  be  used,  as  soon  as  it  no  longer 
has  a  purpose  to  fulfill,  it  begins  to  shrink,  and 
in  the  end  it  either  disappears  altogether,  or  else 
becomes  a  mere  shadow  of  its  former  self.  And 
this  is  precisely  what  we  should  expect.  In  the 
process  of  evolution,  a  process  too  well  accredited 
on  all  sides  to  need  longer  any  defense,  the 
development  of  each  organ  has  come  about  in 
response  to  some  condition  in  the  environment, 
which  demanded  such  an  organ  and  offered  free 
play  for  its  activity.  The  enlargement  of  this 
field  of  action  meant  a  corresponding  growth 
of  the  organ.  A  lessening  of  the  field  meant  a 
shrinkage  of  the  organ.  Withdrawal  of  the  field 
meant  disappearance  of  the  organ.  Illustrations 
abound  on  all  sides.  Animals  deprived  of  light 
for  generations  lose  not  only  the  power  of  sight, 
but  at  last  the  organ  of  sight  as  well.  Such 
apparently  has  been  the  fate  of  the  blind  fishes 
in  the  Mammoth  Cave  and  elsewhere.  Birds 
which  for  any  reason  decline  to  fly,  lose  in  time 
the  strength  of  wing  which  makes  such  flight 
possible.  This  has  been  the  history  of  the  great 
auk. 

These  results  of  natural  selection  are  duplicated 
in  all  experiments  in  breeding.  On  all  sides,  in 
the  animal  world,  we  find  a  constant  interplay 
between  organ  and  function. 

Human  activities  are  subject  to  the  same  law, 

29 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

and  apparently  the  law  is  inexorable.  All  human 
action  has  at  one  time  served  some  definite  pur- 
pose. Otherwise  it  would  never  have  come  into 
being,  for  there  would  have  been  no  generating 
cause.  Human  action  has  reached  its  present 
highly  evolved  form  by  reason  of  the  increasing 
nicety  in  its  adjustment  to  this  purpose.  The 
purpose  itself  represents  the  somewhat  imperative 
opportunity  offered  the  organism  by  the  surround- 
ing conditions.  Remove  this  purpose,  and  the 
movements  which  it  called  forth,  and  which 
respond  to  it,  must  eventually  cease.  There  is 
no  longer  any  stimulus  to  excite  them. 

It  follows,  I  think  unavoidably,  that  all  human 
action  has  a  purpose,  and  is  in  some  degree  an 
adjustment  of  means  to  ends.  Consequently, 
human  conduct,  which  we  have  defined  as  action 
with  a  purpose,  is  coextensive  with  human  action. 
Further,  since  all  action  is  well  or  ill  adapted  to 
accomplish  the  adjustment  of  means  to  ends,  it 
must  be  that  all  action  is  relatively  good  or  bad, 
and  consequently  that  no  action,  however  trivial, 
is  devoid  of  moral  significance.  The  adjustment 
is  open  to  criticism  in  the  matter  of  efficiency ; 
and  the  ends,  in  the  matter  of  worth. 

So  astonishing  a  result  demands  a  restatement. 

What  we  say  is  no  more  nor  less  than  this, 
that  morahty,  which  has  to  do  with  conduct,  and 
with  that  conduct  which  is  good,  has  in  reality 

30 


HUMAN    CONDUCT 


to  do  with  life,  and  with  life  in  its  entirety.  The 
subject-matter  of  morals  includes  the  sum  total 
of  human  action. 

This  is  not  what  people  commonly  believe,  and 
it  deviates  in  two  important  respects.  It  is  com- 
monly asserted  that  conduct  is  not  coextensive 
with  human  action,  and  also  that  of  recognized 
conduct  a  portion  is  quite  neutral,  quite  devoid 
of  moral  significance.  Both  these  assertions  must 
receive  due  consideration,  and  especially  from 
those  who  are  at  all  earnest  in  their  quest  of 
right  conduct,  for  they  must  believe,  as  follow- 
ers of  the  gods  of  causation,  that  the  majority 
failure  to  reach  an  individual  good  fortune  which 
will  square  with  objective  moral  standards,  and 
so  be  good  fortune  in  very  truth,  is  a  failure  to 
reckon  with  just  these  simple  and  obvious  matters 
of  the  law. 

And  first  in  regard  to  human  action  at  large. 
As  I  have  tried  to  point  out,  no  action  devoid  of 
purpose  is  continuously  possible.  As  soon  as  the 
adjustment  of  means  to  ends  ceases,  there  is  no 
longer  any  force  at  work  to  retain  the  action  itself. 
As  organisms  shaped  by  the  process  of  evolution, 
we  can  do  nothing  that  is  essentially  meaningless. 
Every  movement  is  towards  some  end.  The  end 
may  be  relatively  unimportant,  but  from  this  it 
passes  to  ends  of  the  utmost  importance.  All 
bodily  activity  confirms  this  statement.  The  body 

31 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

is  indeed  but  a  collection  of  organic  industries,  a 
veritable  bee-hive,  and  all  the  drones  are  killed. 
The  secretions  of  the  glands,  the  pulsations  of  the 
diaphragm,  the  molecular  changes  in  the  brain, 
the  actions  and  reactions  among  the  nerves,  all 
have  this  in  common,  that  they  have  work  to  do. 
The  manner  in  which  they  do  this  work  marks 
the  difference  between  a  healthy  and  an  un- 
healthy organism.  The  more  perfect  the  adjust- 
ment of  means  to  ends,  the  more  complete  the 
manifestation  of  life.  From  perfect  to  imperfect, 
the  adjustment  passes  through  all  intervening 
stages  as  we  journey  from  health  to  disease,  until 
finally  we  reach  death  itself,  for  death  —  as  a 
matter  of  definition  —  is  but  a  complete  failure 
of  organic  adjustment  of  means  to  ends.  How- 
ever much  it  may  be  at  variance  with  our  initial 
view,  I  do  not  see  how  we  can  escape  the  con- 
clusion that  conduct  is  truly  coextensive  with 
human  action.  Every  breath,  every  heart  beat, 
every  tear,  the  movement  of  every  single  mole- 
cule, the  movement  of  every  limb,  each  and  every 
activity  of  the  whole,  has  purpose,  serves  an  end, 
and  is  therefore  a  part  of  that  supreme  thing 
which  we  call  human  conduct. 

Conduct  is  not  three  fourths  of  life,  —  it  is  the 
whole  of  life. 

We  turn  now  to  that  other  aspect  of  the  case, 
to  the  equally  inclusive  answer  we  have  given  as 

32 


HUMAN    CONDUCT 


to  how  much  of  conduct  is  open  to  moral  criti- 
cism. It  is  an  avowal  fraught  with  very  deep 
meaning  when  we  assert,  as  we  do  here  quite  with- 
out reservation,  that  just  as  there  is  no  human 
activity  outside  the  pale  of  conduct,  so  there  is  no 
conduct  without  moral  significance.  It  is  entirely 
true  that  there  is  to-day  much  conduct  which  is 
seemingly  neutral.  We  have  not  fine  enough  per- 
ception to  classify  it  properly.  The  problem  is  too 
subtle  for  such  thick  wits  to  grasp,  but  the  prob- 
lem is  nevertheless  there.  From  these  extreme 
cases  at  the  one  end,  these  over-niceties,  conduct 
passes  by  quite  insensible  degrees  to  those  equally 
extreme  cases  at  the  other  end,  to  those  moral 
possibilities  in  conduct  so  obvious  as  to  be  recog- 
nized by  the  civilized  world  generally,  and  even 
by  a  part  of  the  savage  world. 

The  tremendous  moral  significance  of  all  con- 
duct will  be  brought  out  more  clearly  if  we  con- 
sider the  events  of  a  single  day,  and  especially 
the  small  events. 

We  waken  in  the  morning.  The  room  in  which 
we  find  ourselves  is  full  of  moral  significance. 
Have  we  slept  with  the  window  opened  or  closed  ? 
Is  the  air  in  the  room  sweet  and  wholesome,  or 
stuffy  and  vitiated  ?  We  are  still  in  bed.  Is  the 
bed  hygienically  constructed,  or  is  it  not  ?  Is  it 
health-giving  or  health-taking  ?  Is  the  pillow  so 
high  as  to  induce  curvature  of  the  spine,  or  so  low 

33 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

as  to  encourage  rush  of  blood  to  the  head  ?  Are 
the  covers  suitable,  not  heavy  enough  to  weaken, 
and  not  light  enough  to  expose?  How  is  the 
body  itself  encased,  is  it  suffocated  in  heavy  flan- 
nels which  are  to  be  worn  continuously  through- 
out the  ensuing  day,  or  is  some  thought  given  to 
the  skin  and  its  needs  ? 

One  is  still  in  bed.  Shall  one  get  up  at  once,  or 
shall  one  lie  abed  ?  Shall  one  be  content  idly  to 
dream,  half  awake  and  half  asleep,  or  shall  one 
arouse  one's  seK  mentally  and  work  out  some 
problem  of  the  daily  life,  some  aspect  of  indi- 
vidual duty  ? 

And  then  when  you  are  up,  what  alternatives 
present  themselves  at  every  step  !  Is  the  furni- 
ture of  your  bedroom  convenient,  does  it  allow 
you  to  carry  on  the  several  activities  of  the  toilet 
with  little  friction,  or  is  it  clumsy  and  ill-arranged, 
abounding  in  dust-harboring  contrivances,  and 
so  stacked  as  to  impede  all  wholesome  move- 
ments ?  Is  the  room  clean  ?  Are  the  floor  cover- 
ing and  wall  paper  and  window  hangings  reason- 
ably free  from  germs  and  poisons  ?  What  of  the 
bath,  shall  it  be  hot  or  cold,  and  what  clothing 
shall  be  worn  ?  When  you  are  dressed,  is  it  bet- 
ter to  go  directly  downstairs  to  the  family  group, 
or  to  stop  awhile  with  yourself,  repeating  aloud, 
or  in  your  own  heart,  the  hope  and  aspiration 
of  the  day  ?   If  you  decide  to  stop,  will  the  spirit 

34 


HUMAN    CONDUCT 


be  more  refreshed  by  a  few  pages  of  good  news, 
or  by  saluting  the  morning  and  the  universe 
from  your  own  window  ? 

We  do  not  commonly  think  of  all  these  matters 
as  having  to  do  with  the  moral  life,  with  the 
quest  of  that  good  fortune  which  bears  inspec- 
tion, but  my  including  of  them  here  is  not  at  all 
fanciful.  Each  element  that  I  have  just  named 
conditions  the  health  and  the  spirit,  gives  color 
to  the  ensuing  day,  makes  possible  sound  judg- 
ment, generous  action,  right  relations,  or  makes 
them  impossible.  So  deeply  laden  with  conse- 
quences are  these  simple  actions  of  the  daily  life 
that  it  would  be  irrational  in  the  last  degree  to 
deny  them  a  moral  significance.  On  the  contrary, 
their  chief  content  is  moral. 

And  you  have  not  yet  opened  the  door  of 
your  bedchamber.  So  far  you  have  had  to  do 
only  with  yourself,  with  your  own  organism,  and 
yet  everything  you  have  done  has  been  fairly 
subject  to  the  criticism  of  morality,  has  been 
relatively  good  or  relatively  bad,  has  helped 
you  forward  on  the  quest  or  has  hindered  you. 
Open  the  door,  and  the  problem  becomes  tre- 
mendously more  complicated,  for  you  have  to  do 
with  others  as  well  as  with  yourself.  The  com- 
plexity begins  with  the  first  face  you  see  and  the 
first  voice  you  hear.  What  does  your  own  face 
proclaim,  what  is  your  own  salutation  ?   Are  they 

35 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

such  as  to  warm  and  cheer  and  strengthen,  or  do 
they  chill  and  depress  and  devitalize  ? )  There  are 
large  moral  possibilities  just  here.  And  at  the 
breakfast-table,  what  do  you  talk  about?  This 
is  far  from  being  a  matter  of  moral  indifference. 
Do  you  bury  yourself  in  the  morning  paper,  and 
read  on  in  rude  silence  ?  Do  you  open  your  mail 
and  quite  ignore  the  other  people  present  ?  Do 
you  omit  to  say  ^good-morning'  to  the  maid-ser- 
vant? 

These  minor  moralities  are  not  mentioned  in 
the  decalogue,  and  they  are  ignored  by  many 
persons  who  consider  themselves  moral,  but  their 
omission  makes  up  the  major  budget  in  the  im- 
morahty  of  Hfe. 

Furthermore,  there  is  the  immorality  of  the 
second-best.  One  may  talk,  and  both  agreeably 
and  politely  for  that  matter,  and  yet  not  say  the 
best  thing  that  one  is  capable  of  saying.  The 
talk  may  be  clever  and  yet  leave  a  bad  taste  in 
the  mouth.  It  may  serve  to  cheapen  life,  may 
stimulate  the  evil  expectation,  may  make  more 
difficult  for  some  listening  soul  the  reahzation 
of  the  ideal  life.  What  one  does,  and  what  one 
refrains  from  doing,  both  involve  a  positive 
moral  issue. 

Nor  is  the  problem  of  the  breakfast-table  — 
a  homely  problem,  but  one,  nevertheless,  which 
comes  to  a  man   three  hundred  and  sixty-five 

36 


HUMAN    CONDUCT 


times  a  year  —  confined  to  the  altruistic  side  of 
things.  The  talk  reacts  upon  one's  self.  The 
occasion,  like  the  bed  that  one  has  just  left,  may 
be  health-giving  or  health-taking.  To  speak  hon- 
estly and  nobly,  to  speak  upon  worthy  topics, 
does  indeed  affect  the  whole  family  group,  but 
no  one  so  intimately  as  the  speaker  himself.  In 
helping  others  climb,  one  must  needs  climb  one's 
self. 

I  am  not  forgetting  that  the  primary  object 
of  a  breakfast  is  the  taking  of  food.  What  one 
eats,  what  one  drinks,  and  what  one  desists  from 
eating  and  drinking  constitute  a  most  impor- 
tant part  of  conduct,  and  one  not  sufficiently  in- 
sisted upon.  The  housekeeper  who  assumes  the 
duty  of  selecting  and  preparing  food  for  a  family 
group,  and  particularly  if  the  group  include 
young  children,  assumes  a  very  great  duty  and 
generally  fulfills  it  badly.  It  is,  I  think,  an  ad- 
mitted fact  that  much  of  the  drunkenness  in 
America  is  directly  traceable  to  wretched  cookery 
and  the  consequent  lack  of  proper  nutrition.  It 
is  very  clear  that  morality  is  but  dealing  with  the 
causes  of  things,  with  conduct  germs,  so  to  speak, 
when  she  pronounces  for  or  against  a  given  diet. 
And  here,  as  elsewhere,  the  moral  Hfe  demands 
self-activity.  In  the  absence  of  anything  like 
uniform  temperament,  or  indeed  of  any  very  defi- 
nite scientific  knowledge  in  the  matter  of  foods, 

37 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

there  is  no  ideal  diet  to  be  prescribed  for  all. 
Discrimination  is  necessary,  and  discrimination 
becomes  a  part  of  morality.  Voltaire,  it  will  be 
remembered,  declared  that  he  had  no  respect  for 
a  man  who  after  thirty  asked  his  physician  what 
he  should  eat. 

It  may  be  a  moral  or  an  immoral  act  to  drink 
a  cup  of  chocolate,  —  highly  immoral  if  the 
chocolate  bring  indigestion,  for  the  indigestion 
produces  headache,  sluggishness,  incapacity,  and 
these  mean  depression  of  spirit  and  unsoundness 
of  judgment.  These  have  to  do  most  unmistak- 
ably with  conduct,  and  if  morality  condemn  the 
conduct,  the  condemnation  must  include  the 
whole  causal  chain,  —  the  physiological  condition 
which  brought  about  the  unsoundness,  the  food 
which  induced  such  a  condition,  the  ignorance 
or  self-indulgence  which  led  to  the  taking  of  the 
food.  Nor  does  the  moral  chain  come  quite  to 
an  end,  even  here.  We  have  still  to  seek  out  the 
causes  of  the  ignorance  or  self-indulgence.  This 
carries  us  back  over  a  road  which  ends  only  with 
the  dawn  of  consciousness,  and  gives  to  the  prob- 
lem of  morality  a  truly  Titanic  aspect. 

Outside  the  house  door,  and  the  problem  is 
still  further  complicated.  One  has  to  deal  not 
only  with  one's  self  and  with  one's  fellows  in  their 
individual  capacity,  but  with  a  corporate  whole, 
with  society,  and  this  evidently  requires  further 

38 


HUMAN   CONDUCT 


adjustments  of  means  to  ends,  adjustments  which 
may  be  relatively  very  good  or  relatively  very 
bad.  And  yet  the  day  has  hardly  begun.  There 
are  twenty-four  hours  to  be  considered,  and 
though  the  moral  content  of  the  hours  differs  in 
seriousness,  it  is  manifest,  I  think,  that  no  hour 
is  devoid  of  significance. 

This  all  too  brief  and  inadequate  survey  has 
included  only  those  actions  which  are  more  or 
less  conscious.  But  in  saying  that  conduct  is 
coextensive  with  human  action,  we  commit  our- 
selves to  everything.  We  necessarily  include  in 
conduct  every  movement  of  whatsoever  nature. 

It  is  common  to  divide  all  human  activity  into 
voluntary  and  involuntary  movements.  If  moral 
criticism  did  not  go  back  of  results  to  causes,  it 
would  clearly  have  little  to  do  with  the  move- 
ments that  are  involuntary.  Many  of  them  are 
so  far  involuntary  that  we  hardly  think  of  them 
as  having  any  concern  whatever  with  the  affairs 
of  the  conscious  life.  In  many  cases,  it  is  only 
when  disease  interrupts  these  movements,  or,  to 
speak  more  accurately,  when  the  interruptions 
and  irregularities  in  the  movements  declare  them- 
selves in  disease,  that  we  are  in  any  sense  aware 
of  them.  To  this  class  of  involuntary  movements 
belong  the  pulsation  of  the  heart,  the  circulation 
of  the  blood,  the  respiration  of  the  lungs,  the 
digestive  action  of  the  stomach,  the  secretions  of 

39 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

the  glands^  and  many  other  less  obvious  bodily 
functions.  All  these  movements  are  full  of  pur- 
pose, are  manifest  adjustments  of  means  to  ends, 
and  are  therefore  well  within  the  boundaries  of 
conduct.  By  our  very  definition  of  conduct,  human 
activity  which  involves  a  purpose,  these  involun- 
tary movements  have  a  part  in  conduct  quite  as 
well  assured  as  have  those  more  obvious  bodily 
movements  which  come  under  the  direct  control 
of  the  will  and  are  classed  as  voluntary.  Further- 
more, these  involuntary  movements  would  still 
be  open  to  moral  criticism,  were  they  as  truly 
beyond  control  as  they  are  seemingly,  for  they 
undoubtedly  serve  well  or  ill  the  purposes  for 
which  they  exist.  But  the  criticism  would  lack 
any  very  vital  interest.  A  doctrine  of  conduct 
which  gravely  considered  the  moral  aspect  of  the 
circulation  of  the  blood,  while  it  expressly  declared 
that  such  circulation  was  both  involuntary  and 
beyond  even  indirect  control,  would  attract  few 
students.  If  we  calmly  turn  over  all  these  bodily 
functions  to  the  care  of  the  subconscious  self, 
and  dechne  all  further  responsibihty,  there  is  not 
much  more  to  be  said.  But  there  is  another  and 
more  helpful  way  of  looking  at  the  matter,  the 
causational  and  scientific  way.  The  element  of 
human  interest  comes  back  again,  and  vitalizes 
the  moral  criticism,  as  soon  as  it  is  recognized 
that  the  circulation  of  the  blood,  though  beyond 

40 


HUMAN    CONDUCT 


present  direct  volition,  is  nevertheless  subject  to 
distinct  conditions,  such  as  exercise  and  the  like, 
which  are  themselves  under  the  complete  control 
of  the  will.  The  sense  of  human  interest  and 
responsibility  deepens  when  it  is  further  borne  in 
mind  that  the  circulation  of  the  blood  plainly 
conditions  brain  action,  and  so  has  very  immedi- 
ately to  do  with  the  life  of  the  spirit,  and  with 
all  that  goes  to  make  up  conduct.  Viewed  in 
this  light,  the  moral  aspect  of  the  circulation  of 
the  blood  is  seen  to  be  a  very  grave  reality,  and 
not  at  all  the  absurdity  which  it  at  first  sight 
appeared  to  be. 

In  the  same  way  it  can  readily  be  shown  that 
all  those  bodily  movements  which  we  are  pleased 
to  call  involuntary  may  in  reality  be  brought 
under  the  control  of  the  will,  if  we  have  the 
patience  and  knowledge.  It  is  only  that  the 
causal  chain  between  volition  and  movement  is 
more  circuitous.  But  the  gods  of  causation  are 
still  in  control. 

If  we  accept  this  view  of  human  conduct,  and 
make  it  coextensive  with  human  activity,  that  is 
to  say,  with  life,  then  the  practice  of  morality  be- 
comes the  one  possible  human  art.  The  secret  of 
good  fortune  is  found  to  rest  in  control.  Faith- 
fulness in  seeking  knowledge,  and  an  equal  faith- 
fulness in  applying  it,  constitute  the  genuine 
alchemy  by  which  a  dull,  commonplace,  wretched 

41 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

life  may  be  transformed  into  something  radiant, 
interesting,  and  helpful.  It  is  the  practical  pro- 
cess by  which  human  poverty  is  supplanted  by 
human  wealth. 

I  cannot  help  regarding  such  a  conclusion, 
that  conduct  is  everything,  as  a  truly  overwhelm- 
ing conclusion.  It  does  away  with  all  smaller 
conceptions  of  the  significance  of  life,  and  car- 
ries one  quite  irresistibly  into  regions  of  higher 
effort  and  attainment.  But  it  seems  to  me  a  con- 
clusion from  which  we  may  not  escape.  And 
indeed,  when  we  come  to  understand  the  nature 
of  the  moral  standard,  it  is  a  conclusion  from 
which  we  would  not  wish  to  escape. 


IV 

RIGHT  AND  WRONG 

IF  conduct  include  the  whole  of  human  activ- 
ity, and  morality  have  to  do  with  right  con- 
duct, it  becomes  a  matter  of  the  utmost  impor- 
tance to  inquire  what  makes  human  activity  good 
or  bad,  right  or  wrong. 

Touching  as  it  does  the  whole  of  life,  the 
question  of  what  is  right  and  what  is  wrong  in 
conduct  is  one  of  those  fundamental  interests 
which  may  not  be  neglected  by  a  single  human 
being.  One  may  properly  doubt  if  the  question 
is  ever  totally  neglected,  from  the  feeblest  of  the 
race  up  to  the  most  strenuous.  We  are  all  avow- 
edly after  good  fortune,  some  persistently,  some 
intermittently,  many  mistakenly.  When  the  quest 
is  on,  there  must  needs  be  a  certain  amount  of 
reflection,  at  least  some  rudimentary  inquiry  into 
cause  and  effect,  some  show  of  a  plan.  It  is 
even  reasonable  to  believe  that  this  elementary 
morality  exists  among  animals;  possibly,  in  a 
modified  form,  among  plants.  Such  a  belief  may 
easily  rest  upon  one's  own  limited  personal  ob- 
servation, and  still  more  upon  the  large  body  of 
evidence  gathered  by  Spencer  and  others  regard- 

43 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

ing  the  behavior  of  dogs  and  cats  and  other 
highly  developed  animals.  The  evidence  is  the 
more  remarkable  becauSe  it  appears  to  show  that 
this  incipient  morality  is  particularly  manifested 
in  those  animals  which  have  come  in  the  closest 
contact  with  man,  the  so-called  domestic  animals. 

It  would  carry  us  too  far  afield  to  go  into 
the  question  of  animal  morality,  but  I  think  we 
may  safely  assume  it  as  an  established  fact.  Our 
dogs  and  cats  and  horses,  even  the  less  clever 
inhabitants  of  the  barnyard,  show  a  rudimentary 
sense  of  right  and  wrong  which  adds  immensely 
to  their  interest  and  companionableness.  Wild 
animals,  made  more  alert  by  the  necessity  of 
winning  their  own  food,  and  by  the  constant 
presence  of  danger,  show  an  even  keener  intel- 
ligence, and  a  team  morality  which  perhaps  im- 
presses us  less  than  the  individual  expediency 
of  the  domestic  animals,  because  it  spends  itself 
against  us,  instead  of  for  us.  That  the  belief  in 
animal  morality  is  an  acceptable  one  is  shown 
by  the  popular  delight  in  modern  animal  stories, 
tales  which  differ  essentially  from  the  old  ani- 
mal fables  in  being  told,  as  far  as  a  man  can  tell 
them,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  animals 
themselves. 

If,  indeed,  we  followed  Hobbes  and  the  earlier 
English  moralists  in  making  morality  wholly  and 
avowedly  prudential,  a  more  or  less  enlightened 

44 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


scheme  of  self-preservation,  we  should  have  to 
accord  morality  to  plants  as  well  as  to  animals. 
^  The  struggle  for  existence '  would  be  their 
good  deeds.  And  still  more  should  we  have  to 
accord  morality  to  such  lowly  organisms  as  the 
infusoria,  which  never  die. 

This  reference  to  the  non-human  world  is  not 
a  mere  idle  fancy.  It  is  meant  to  serve  as  a 
deliberate  introduction  to  the  very  modern  and 
at  the  same  time  the  very  ancient  conception  that 
the  moral  law  is  as  much  of  the  soul  of  things 
as  gravitation  itself.  Structures  built  without 
due  regard  to  gravitation  collapse.  Human  lives 
conducted  without  regard  to  the  moral  law  come 
to  grief.  Ttiere  is  a  necessary  connection  between 
morality  and  well-being,  between  immorality  and 
disaster.  Morality  must  be  accounted,  not  as  a 
human  device  for  keeping  the  rabble  in  order, 
but  as  a  very  much  more  august  thing,  as  a 
veritable  law  of  nature. 

In  venturing  such  a  comparison  between  mo- 
lality and  gravitation,  we  seem  to  be  naming  on 
the  one  hand  a  group  of  very  subtle,  complicated, 
spiritual  phenomena,  and  on  the  other  hand  a 
group  of  obvious,  simple,  and  highly  material 
•happenings.  Yet  they  are  in  many  ways  parallel. 
It  is  to  be  remembered  that  gravitation  covers 
not  only  such  visible  events  as  falling  bodies, 
but  also  the  less  obvious  manifestations  of  chemi- 

45 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

cal  affinity  and  the  greater  mystery  of  the  ether, 
the  almost  spiritual  phenomena  of  light  and  elec- 
tricity. We  may  grant  that  morality  starts  out 
with  bare  self-preservation,  the  limited  virtue  of 
mineral,  plant,  animal,  and  savage.  But  as  the 
self  expands,  as  it  becomes  more  sensitive,  more 
human,  more  spiritual,  self-preservation  ceases  to 
be  a  bare  term.  It  becomes  the  name  of  a  highly 
involved  ministry.  The  advantage  of  our  com- 
parison, or  if  you  prefer,  our  analogy,  does  not 
consist,  however,  in  tracing  any  close  parallel- 
ism, but  in  pointing  out  beyond  peradventure 
that  morality,  like  gravitation,  is  not  an  elec- 
tive, but  an  obligatory,  unescapable  element  in 
life. 

In  saying  that  morality  is  a  law  of  nature,  we 
invest  it  with  no  false  or  mysterious  function,  no 
veiled  origin.  We  state  a  simple  matter  of  ex- 
perience, and  connect  it  with  so  much  of  cause 
and  effect  as  we  have  been  able  to  perceive. 
The  so-called  laws  of  nature  deal  with  the  mys- 
teries of  existence  and  touch  the  boundary  of 
the  unknowable,  but  they  are  themselves  no 
mystery.  They  are  statements  prompted  by  ex- 
perience, mere  human  statements  of  the  common 
element  in  a  series  of  related  events.  As  such, 
these  laws  are  open  to  enlargement,  revision, 
even  total  restatement.  Nor  do  these  laws  ex- 
plain themselves.    They  only  sum  up  our  present 

46 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


state  of  knowledge  on  that  particular  subject. 
None  of  us  knows  what  gravitation  is.  Our  law 
of  gravitation  is  a  convenient  working  formula, 
which  tells  us  how  the  force  acts.  Bodies  attract 
each  other  directly  as  their  mass,  and  inversely 
as  the  square  of  the  distance.  It  is  quite  con- 
ceivable that  the  whole  of  gravitation,  were  it 
known,  could  be  summed  up  in  a  final  formula 
which  would  constitute  absolute  law.  We  phrase 
these  matters,  but  we  really  never  come  up  with 
them.  Because  our  partial  human  law  may  be  a 
part  of  very  truth,  may  be  a  tiny  clause  in  the 
final  law,  we  are  not  justified  in  parading  it  as 
infallible.  At  the  most,  our  laws  of  nature  are 
merely  laws  of  nature  as  we  see  it,  human  proba- 
bilities of  greater  or  less  weight,  but  never  more 
than  this. 

In  quite  the  same  way  we  are  constrained 
to  deal  with  morality.  The  absolute  morality 
touched  upon  in  The  Problem  bears  to  our 
human  morality  the  same  relation  that  all  absolute 
law  bears  to  all  human  law,  —  the  one  is  stated  to 
be  the  whole  fact,  the  other  may  be  a  part  of  the 
fact.  This  sends  the  student  of  morals  back  to 
^  very  old  teacher,  —  one  said  to  be  the  best,  — 
that  is,  to  experience.  All  he  can  hope  to  gain 
is  a  high  degree  of  probability.  But  this  is  all 
that  the  student  of  gravitation  can  hope  to  gain. 
The  result,  partial  as  it  admittedly  is,  is  far  from 

47 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

contemptible,  for  it  is  enough  to  differentiate 
right  from  wrong. 

It  may  be  that  at  first  sight  this  view  seems 
calculated  to  rob  morality  of  all  certainty,  and 
the  moralist  of  all  enthusiasm.  But  after  all, 
human  experience  —  the  historical  life  of  man  — 
is  a  pretty  definite  thing  for  those  who  care  to 
read  the  record  with  any  degree  of  temperance 
and  disinterestedness.  Morality  may  present  a 
shifting  standard  of  conduct  from  the  point  of 
view  of  the  ages,  but  at  any  given  time  it  is 
fairly  specific.  It  is  the  science  of  that  conduct 
which  to-day  is  held  to  be  good. 

Before  finally  letting  slip  our  analogy  of  phy- 
sical laws,  it  may  be  well  to  suggest  that  they 
all  rest  upon  quite  the  same  grounds  as  morality, 
that  is  to  say,  upon  experience.  We  do  not  on 
this  account  feel  any  disquietude  in  our  daily 
going  and  coming  in  the  material  world.  We  do 
not  know  the  whole  of  gravitation,  but  we  adjust 
ourselves  to  so  much  of  it  as  we  do  know,  and 
so  escape  the  major  disasters.  The  shifting  of 
morals,  like  the  shifting  in  physical  research,  in 
spite  of  positions  given  over,  commonly  leaves 
enough  solid  ground  to  stand  upon.  We  never 
at  one  time  throw  over  our  entire  body  of  doc- 
trine in  either  morals  or  natural  history.  The  new 
conceptions  must  needs  justify  themselves,  and 
so  can  make  their  way  only  slowly  and  gradually. 

48 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


Furthermore,  it  is  worth  remarking  that  physi- 
cal research,  by  reason  of  technical  resource  and 
modern  prosperity,  has  been  able  of  recent  years 
to  go  into  the  most  subtle  and  fascinating  inquir- 
ies that  it  has  ever  entered  upon,  inquiries  into 
radiant  energy  and  waves  and  vibrations,  matters 
so  delicate  that  they  might  almost  be  classed  as 
spiritual.  Totally  new  worlds  are  being  opened 
up ;  totally  new  conceptions  of  the  universe  are 
being  propounded.  These  matters  were  hidden 
even  from  the  acute  mind  of  Greece,  for  thought 
can  advance  only  when  going  hand  in  hand 
with  experiment,  that  is,  with  systematized  expe- 
rience. The  same  thing  holds  true  in  morality 
The  very  difficulties  and  complexities  of  mod- 
ern social  experience  carry  us  into  new  concep- 
tions of  human  relations,  and  new  perceptions  of 
social  possibilities.  It  is  no  exaggeration  to  say 
that  the  twentieth  century  opens,  in  matters  of 
morality,  with  as  large  opportunity  for  elaborate 
research,  and  as  great  a  chance  for  helpful  dis- 
covery, as  it  offers  in  the  physical  world.  But  the 
method  must  be  the  same.  It  may  not  be  purely 
speculative.  It  must  needs  be  experimental,  must 
consist  in  reflections  based  upon  immediate,  first- 
hand experience. 

This  very  brief  examination  of  the  matter 
makes  it  plain  that  no  final  definition  of  right 
and  wrong  can  ever  be  given.    When  man  has 

49 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

done  his  very  best^  the  moral  possibilities  are  not 
yet  exhausted.  One  more  day  of  life,  one  added 
experience,  and  morality  has  fresh  data  that  must 
needs  be  taken  account  of.  We  may  say  in  a 
general  way  that  conduct,  or  purposeful  human 
activity,  is  right  or  good  when  it  promotes  human 
weKare,  and  that  conduct  is  wrong  or  bad  when 
it  hinders  human  welfare.  Accepting  the  broad 
definition  of  conduct  as  adjustment  of  means  to 
ends,  it  is  increasingly  clear  that  moral  criticism 
has  to  do  both  with  the  efficiency  of  the  means 
and  the  human  worth  of  the  ends.  The  proper 
standards  of  efficiency  and  of  worth  are  discover- 
able only  through  daily  experience.  This  empha- 
sizes once  more  our  initial  position,  that  morality 
can  be  known  only  to  those  who  are  its  prac- 
titioners as  well  as  its  students.  In  saying  what 
conduct  is  right  and  what  is  wrong,  morality  may 
neglect  neither  efficiency  nor  worth.  Her  judg- 
ments may  sum  up  the  matter,  but  they  must 
contain  both  these  factors  as  essential  elements. 

Efficiency  alone  may  give  us  simply  the  accom- 
plished rascal,  the  man  of  Napoleon's  type.  The 
worthy  purpose  alone  may  give  us  th*e  most  use- 
less of  sentimentalists,  the  man  of  Rousseau's 
type. 

It  is  true  that  both  Napoleon  and  Rousseau 
have  been  accorded  the  genial  praise  of  per- 
sons who  suppose  themselves  moral.    Napoleon  so 

50 


RIGHT   AND    WRONG 


dazzled  the  world  by  the  high  efficiency  of  his 
methods  that  he  quite  blinded  it  to  the  gigantic 
evil  of  his  ends.  But  the  judgment  of  posterity 
grows  discriminating.  More  and  more,  Napoleon 
is  spoken  of  as  a  tarnished  idol,  and  the  greatest 
of  modern  alienists,  Lombroso,  classes  him  as 
a  criminal  of  genius.  The  same  bedazzlement  is 
seen,  in  our  own  day,  in  the  imperialism  which 
dominates  the  policy  of  more  than  one  world- 
power.  The  carrying  out  of  these  imperialistic 
schemes  has  involved  so  much  undoubted  heroism 
and  excellence  that  men  have  been  fascinated  by 
the  spectacle  of  high  efficiency,  and  have  appar- 
ently forgotten  to  inquire  into  the  worth  of  the 
ends.  It  seems  that  nothing  succeeds  like  success. 
With  Rousseau,  we  have  the  opposite  defect. 
His  plans  for  the  education  of  the  young  were  so 
admirable  in  themselves,  and  were  presented  with 
such  literary  skill,  that  they  quite  took  Europe 
by  storm,  and  this,  too,  when  his  own  children 
were  being  shamelessly  turned  over  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  foundling  asylums. 

These  two  types,  the  man  of  high  efficiency 
and  evil  ends,  the  man  of  excellent  purpose  and 
feeble  execution,  do  not  represent  good  fortune. 
From  neither  the  individual  nor  the  social  point 
of  view  can  such  careers  be  called  successful. 
They  fail  to  promote  human  welfare,  and  fail- 
ing this,  they  are  not  able  to  commend  themselves 

51 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

to  the  moral  judgment  of  mankind.  Morality  has 
always  this  double  aspect.  Both  aspects  must  be 
remembered,  and  the  double  demand  which  they 
set  up  must  be  satisfied,  or  else  the  final  verdict 
is  necessarily  one  of  condemnation. 

To  handle  successfully  so  complicated  a  double 
problem  as  this,  one  must  begin  by  simplifying 
the  problem  as  far  as  possible. 

Perhaps  the  greatest  and  most  helpful  simpli- 
fication comes  from  remembering  that  morality 
has  no  judgment  to  pass  upon  persons.  It  deals 
only  with  conduct,  with  human  activity,  and  this 
in  the  most  impersonal  way.  It  is  a  judgment 
of  conduct,  and  not  upon  conduct.  Morality 
has  but  one  function,  and  that  is  to  measure. 
It  measures  the  efficiency  of  the  means  and  the 
worth  of  the  ends.  Morality  neither  condemns 
nor  approves,  neither  blames  nor  praises.  The 
moral  vocabulary  is  free  from  all  personal  terms. 
Strictly  speaking,  morality  does  not  know  the 
meaning  of  such  words  as  '  merit '  and  '  demerit,' 
'  responsibility,'  ^  obligation,'  '  opportunity,'  or 
even  of  that  word  which  is  supposed  to  be  its 
peculiar  possession,  the  word  ^duty.'  These  are 
terms  of  human  stress  and  strain,  and  very 
precious  terms  they  are  in  their  right  connection. 
But  morality  itself  is  absolutely  passionless. 
Just  as  morphology  studies  and  classifies  the 
observed  forms  of  matter,  so  morality  studies  and 

52 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


classifies  the  observed  manifestations  of  the 
human  spirit.  Morphology  passes  no  judgment 
upon  matter,  neither  condemns  nor  approves  the 
manifold  works  of  creation,  does  not  blame  the 
lump  of  clay  for  its  lowly  state,  or  praise  the  dia- 
mond for  its  brilliancy.  Morality  stands  in  the 
same  attitude.  It  is  simply  a  keen,  accurate,  piti- 
less measuring-rod  of  the  desirable  and  undesir- 
able in  human  conduct. 

Such  a  view  of  morality  makes  one,  metaphori- 
cally speaking,  button  up  one's  coat  and  turn  up 
one's  collar.  But  the  warmth  lost  on  one  side  is 
gained  on  the  other.  If  morality  does  not  praise, 
neither  does  it  blame.  Its  one  motto  with  respect 
to  persons  is :  Judge  not. 

So  large  a  charity  as  this  makes  possible  the 
true  position  which  morality  aspires  to  occupy. 
It  would  be  neither  accuser  nor  judge.  It  aspires 
rather  to  be  that  light  whose  rays  wiU  enable  the 
individual  soul  to  judge,  and  if  need  be,  to  con- 
demn itself.  Morality  would  be  an  illumination 
playing  about  the  problems  of  the  inner  life,  the 
illumination  of  an  adequate  knowledge. 

This  frank  avowal  of  the  strict  function  of 
morals  may  force  us  to  part  company  with  a  large 
number  of  earnest  moralists,  men  who  have  joined 
with  their  criticism  of  conduct  a  large  admixture 
of  what  seem  to  be  totally  irrelevant  consid- 
erations.   More  particularly  will  they  take  issue 

53 


THE    CHILDREN    OF   GOOD   FORTUI^E 

with  the  elimination  of  such  words  as '  duty  '  and 
^  ought '  from  the  vocabulary  of  morals ;  and 
with  our  somewhat  stubborn  insistence  that 
moraHty  is  merely  a  measuring-rod,  that  it  has 
to  do  with  the  quaUty  of  human  attitudes,  states, 
and  actions,  and  is  in  no  sense  a  judgment  upon 
persons.  But  I  hope  to  make  good  this  conten- 
tion. I  hope  to  be  able  to  show  that  these  terms 
of  hiunan  stress  and  strain  do  not  belong  to  the 
science  of  right  conduct,  but  wholly  to  the  art  of 
right  living,  to  applied  morality.  And  for  this 
art,  we  will  reserve  the  more  personal  word, '  reli- 
gion ' ;  for  as  a  practical  process,  religion  sums 
up  a  man's  attitude  towards  life.  In  speaking  of 
immoral  conduct,  we  may  —  if  the  language 
seem  to  us  temperate  and  becoming  —  employ  the 
terms  of  condemnation  of  an  almost  puritan  zeal. 
But  in  speaking  of  immoral  persons,  we  are  con- 
strained to  feel  no  condemnation,  but  rather  the 
same  genuine  sentiment  of  pity  and  regret  which 
attaches  to  the  image  of  an  ignorant  person ; 
honestly  believing  that  no  one  would  willingly  be 
immoral,  any  more  than  one  would  willingly  be 
ugly  or  unhappy  or  less  fortunate. 

A  further  clearing  of  the  ground  results  from 
a  recognition  of  the  fact,  already  indicated  in 
speaking  of  Napoleon  and  Rousseau,  that  the 
inner  motive  is  not  an  object  of  moral  judgment 
to  the  exclusion  of  the  outer  act.    Both  come 

54 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


within  the  province  of  morality  as  essential  ele- 
ments of  complete  himian  conduct,  and  both  must 
be  fairly  estimated.  A  good  motive  followed  by 
a  bad  act  indicates  a  failure  in  causal  relation,  a 
deficient  executive  machinery.  Morality  declares 
the  intention  good,  but  it  also  declares  the  act 
itself  bad,  and  no  less  bad  because  of  the  good 
intention.  They  are  estimated  separately,  and 
neither  excuses  the  other  or  condemns  the  other. 
In  the  same  way  a  bad  motive  followed  by  a  good 
act  presents  two  aspects  for  moral  criticism.  The 
motive  is  bad,  but  the  act  itself  is  good,  and  no 
less  good  because  of  the  bad  motive.  It  may  be 
that  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  individual,  the 
good  motive  in  any  particular  case,  or  the  absence 
of  bad  motive,  is  more  important  than  the  acci- 
dental outer  bungle,  since  the  motive  expresses 
an  essential  quality  of  character  and  gives  pro- 
mise of  better  things  in  the  future ;  but  from  the 
point  of  view  of  society,  the  bad  act  remains,  and 
also  the  possibility  of  similar  mishaps  in  the 
future.  A  man  may  carelessly  shoot  his  friend 
and  not  be  accounted  a  murderer.  But  the  dead 
man's  children  are  nevertheless  thrown  on  the 
town,  and  through  ignorance  and  want  may  com- 
mit a  hundred  crimes.  Morality  must  consider 
these  results. 

Such  a  clearing  of  the  ground  makes  possible 
a  science  of  right  conduct,  for  it  disentangles 

55 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

the  subject  from  a  number  of  problems  not  easily 
susceptible  of  scientific  treatment,  and  notably 
from  the  ever-recurring  problem  of  free  will  and 
necessity.  We  are  not  forced  to  say  with  Dr. 
Martineau,  and  other  morahsts  of  a  similar  turn 
of  thought,  that  '  either  free  will  is  a  fact,  or 
moral  judgment  a  delusion.'  We  may  be  in- 
terested, on  other  grounds,  in  the  riddle  of  free 
will  and  necessity,  but  it  is  not  an  integral  part 
of  the  problem  of  morals.  It  matters  not  for  our 
present  purpose  —  the  estabhshing  of  a  standard 
of  conduct  —  whether  what  we  do  is  done  under 
the  constraining  force  of  an  iron  necessity,  or 
is  the  act  of  an  agent  perfectly  free  to  choose 
between  right  and  wrong.  Judgment  is  passed 
upon  the  act,  not  upon  the  actor,  and  upon  the 
act  quite  regardless  of  the  forces  at  work  upon 
the  actor. 

The  subject  of  moral  judgment  is  conduct, 
and  the  function  of  right  conduct  is  to  promote 
human  welfare.  One  cannot  say,  a  priori,  just 
what  conduct  will  promote  or  hinder  welfare.  It 
is  possible  to  judge  only  by  observing  the  results 
of  conduct.  Even  the  most  casual  acquaintance 
with  life  warrants  the  position  that,  in  itself, 
conduct  is  neither  good  nor  bad,  but  is  only 
good  or  bad  as  it  does  or  does  not  lead  to  results 
which  are  desirable  No  act,  however  simple,  is  in 
itself  either  right  or  wrong.   It  is  a  question  of 

56 


RIGHT  AND   WRONG 


relation,  just  as  any  given  color  in  the  landscape, 
or  in  a  picture,  has  no  absolute  value,  but  de- 
pends wholly  upon  the  ensemble  of  the  other 
colors. 

Numerous  attempts  have  been  made  to  set  up 
a  criticism  of  conduct  upon  other  than  these  sim- 
ple empirical  grounds.  But  they  have  all  signally 
failed.  And  they  have  failed  because  they  have 
been  unable  to  justify  their  standard  and  make 
clear  its  authority.  '  Thou  shalt '  and  '  Thou 
shalt  not'  are  imperative  commands  as  soon  as 
it  can  be  shown  that  the  one  injunction  leads  to 
good  and  the  other  prevents  evil.  But  without 
this  sanction,  they  would  be  quite  devoid  of  com- 
pelling force.  Every  attempt  to  establish  the 
moral  standard  on  arbitrary  or  artificial  support 
—  whether  it  be  the  supposed  will  of  a  deity,  or 
the  will  of  the  people,  or  the  counsel  of  a  select 
few,  or  the  promptings  of  an  inner  voice,  or  the 
pressure  of  state  power  —  controverts  the  funda- 
mental principle  of  rational  measurement,  and 
is  bound  to  fail.  For  observe  just  what  these 
attempts  mean.  They  endeavor  to  measure  con- 
duct,—  the  adjustment  of  means  to  ends,  —  not 
by  the  efficiency  of  the  adjustment  and  the  worth 
of  the  ends,  but  by  the  imposition  of  an  unre- 
lated unit,  a  false  yardstick.  No  expression  of 
will,  whether  it  be  reputed  oracle  or  the  mere 
roar  of  the  multitude,  can  make  conduct  good  or 

57 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

bad ;  and  failing  this,  it  cannot  be  the  standard 
by  which  conduct  is  to  be  measured. 

In  proposing  to  estimate  conduct  by  its  results, 
we  simply  propose  to  do  what  in  reality  every 
moral  system  now  does,  whatever  may  be  its 
theoretical  standard.  Alike  in  pagan  and  in 
Christian  morals  we  find  the  recognition  of  this 
principle  of  cause  and  effect.  No  system  has 
ever  been  promulgated  in  which  it  was  not  more 
or  less  distinctly  avowed  that  right  conduct  would 
lead  to  personal  welfare,  somewhere,  some  time ; 
and  that  wrong  conduct  would  bring  its  own 
penalty,  here  or  hereafter.  The  Beatitudes,  beau- 
tiful as  they  are,  and  breathing  as  they  do  the 
spirit  of  an  inspiring  devotion,  are  not  unique. 
They  are  found  in  every  language,  in  every  land, 
in  every  age.  Blessed  are  the  good,  for  they 
shall  reap  the  desirable  rewards  of  goodness,  — 
this  is  the  great  and  universal  beatitude.  It 
sums  up  the  moral  experience  of  humanity. 

So  long  as  we  thus  go  forward  from  good 
conduct  to  good  results,  we  all  travel  the  same 
path.  We  may  disagree  in  our  definitions  of 
goodness,  and  in  the  methods  we  advocate  to  re- 
alize it ;  we  may  disagree  in  our  ideas  of  the  wel- 
fare to  be  gained,  and  the  time  of  the  fulfillment, 
but  we  all  agree  that  goodness,  whatever  that 
may  mean,  will  be  followed  by  personal  welfare, 
whatever  that  may  mean.    This  agreement  is  no 

58 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


small  thing.  It  bears  witness  to  the  reality  of  the 
moral  life,  and  to  the  essential  sanity  of  the  rela- 
tions which  prevail  in  that  life.  It  says  in  effect 
that  the  universe  is  a  moral  universe. 

But  when  we  propose  to  estimate  conduct 
solely  by  its  results,  when  we  affirm,  as  the  empiri- 
cist must,  quite  without  qualification,  that  con- 
duct is  good  or  bad  just  so  far  as  its  results  are 
good  or  bad,  and  no  further,  we  meet  commonly 
with  denial  and  dissent.  The  large  company  of 
moralists  who  went  with  us  willingly  enough 
from  good  conduct  forward  to  good  results  will 
not  pass  over  the  same  road  in  a  reverse  direction, 
and  reason  from  good  results  back  to  good  con- 
duct. Good  conduct,  they  say,  always  leads  to 
good  results,  but  it  is  not  the  good  results  that 
make  the  conduct  good ! 

It  is  true  that  the  moral  law  remains  inviolate, 
whatever  sanction  we  may  grant  or  withhold.  It 
may  be  that  that  absolute  morality,  of  which  our 
human  morality  is  but  a  fragment  and  a  shadow, 
rests  upon  ideal  foundations  which  quite  tran- 
scend so  incomplete  a  thing  as  our  limited  human 
experience,  but  the  fact  remains  that  the  abso- 
lute morality  and  the  ideal  foundations  are  not 
given  with  the  human  morality  and  its  super- 
natural sanction  as  necessary  deductions.  It  is 
the  reverse.  The  human  morality  and  its  em- 
pirical sanction  are  the  data  given,  and  the  abso- 

59 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

lute  morality  and  ideal  sanction  are  inferred. 
But  in  neither  case  is  the  authority  of  the  stand- 
ard exterior.  It  is  not  for  us  to  take  or  leave. 
The  authority  is  within,  wrapped  up  in  the  very 
constitution  of  things,  and  as  inevitable  as  the 
law  of  gravitation. 

But  even  were  we  distrustful  of  the  solemnity 
and  dignity  of  human  life,  and  disposed  to  place 
the  authority  of  the  moral  standard  somewhere 
else  than  in  human  experience,  we  should  be  forced 
back  to  this  conclusion  at  the  first  application  of 
our  logic.  There  is  nothing  outside  the  bound- 
aries of  human  experience  for  us  mortals  to  seize 
upon.  Those  who  have  wrestled  with  the  theory 
of  knowledge,  or  have  tried  to  evade  the  drag-net 
of  idealism,  know  how  futile  it  is  to  try  to  erect 
any  abiding  structures  outside  of  human  con- 
sciousness. They  remain  mere  afl&rmations.  If 
we  make  the  moral  standard  rest  upon  other  than 
empirical  authority,  no  matter  how  august  that 
authority  may  be,  or  what  we  name  it,  we  are 
forced  to  admit  that  our  knowledge  of  it  is  human 
and  personal,  that  our  moraHty,  after  all,  is  just 
a  question  of  human  experience.  And  were  we 
to  pass  to  the  extreme  view  and  declare  that 
morality  is  a  matter  of  divine  revelation,  we  must 
stiU  recognize  that  the  channels  of  communica- 
tion are  human,  and  that  our  only  way  of  know- 
ing whether  the  revelation  is  from  God  is  by 

60 


RIGHT   AND   WRONG 


its  character,  its  results,  and  this  again  is  a  mat- 
ter of  pure  experience.  In  practice,  such  an  ap- 
peal is  universally  made.  Such  dissimilar  saints 
as  Jeanne  d'Arc,  Santa  Teresa,  and  Jonathan 
Edwards  are  alike  in  this.  In  protestant  and 
catholic  Christianity,  and  in  fact  in  all  serious 
systems  of  religion,  the  supreme  test  has  always 
been  the  same  :  By  their  fruits. 

Many  questions  allow  the  holding  of  several 
opinions,  and  one  may  honestly  understand  how 
another  man  must  entertain  a  wholly  different 
opinion  from  one's  own.  This  comprehension 
gives  us  our  much-prized  virtue  of  toleration. 
One  would  wish  this  above  all  in  such  vital  and 
temperamental  questions  as  those  concerning 
morality  and  religion.  While  it  seems  impossible 
to  escape  the  belief  that  the  moral  law,  as  we 
know  it,  is  the  necessary  outgrowth  of  the  total 
of  human  experience,  it  is  quite  possible  to  com- 
prehend the  holding  of  very  unlike  opinions  in 
regard  to  the  nature  and  origin  of  that  ideal 
moral  law  of  which  our  human  law  seems  the 
intimation. 

Before  finally  leaving  the  question  of  the  moral 
sanction,  however,  it  is  worth  remarking  that 
those  who  place  the  moral  standard  in  conscience, 
or  instinct,  or  intuition,  are  in  reality  fellow  em- 
piricists;  for  at  bottom,  conscience,  instinct,  and 
intuition  are  but  inductions  from  individual  or 

61 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

race  experience  so  swiftly  drawn  that  we  do  not 
at  first  recognize  their  origin.  The  whole  question 
of  the  moral  sanction  is  a  large  and  controverted 
one,  and  those  who  are  interested  to  follow  it 
will  find  the  discussion  in  extenso  in  any  book 
on  ethics  which  pretends  to  historical  treatment. 
We  are  passing  over  the  matter  so  lightly  here, 
not  in  any  contemptuous  spirit,  but  rather  from 
a  feeling  that  the  question  has  been  pretty  well 
thrashed  out  elsewhere,  and  that  so  long  as  we 
are  agreed  upon  experience  as  the  immediate 
moral  sanction,  we  may  safely  leave  unsettled  the 
vaguer  problem  of  the  ultimate  transcendental 
sanction. 

The  results  of  this  chapter  are  purely  general. 
They  may  be  summed  up  by  saying  that  human 
conduct,  which  includes  all  human  activity,  and 
is  an  adjustment  of  means  to  ends,  is  right  or 
good  when  the  adjustment  is  efficient  and  the 
ends  are  conducive  to  the  highest  human  wel- 
fare. And  furthermore,  that  it  is  only  through 
experience  that  we  can  acquire  a  high  efficiency, 
and  can  learn  in  what  good  fortune  or  welfare 
consists.  To  say  this  is  to  say  once  for  all  that  .we 
are  here  presenting  an  empirical  moraHty.  We 
must  now  be  more  specific,  and  in  succeeding 
chapters  must  inquire  into  efficiency  and  worth 
and  the  daily  problems  pf  the  moyal  life. 


EFFICIENCY 

MEASUREMENT  is  comparison.  The  com- 
parison in  conduct  is  between  the  act  and 
some  end  which  the  act  is  meant  to  achieve. 
This  makes  all  conduct  relative,  the  adjustment 
of  acts  to  ends,  of  the  activity  to  the  purpose 
which  called  it  forth.  Consequently,  the  first 
half  of  moral  judgment  concerns  itself  with  the 
efficiency  of  the  adjustment. 

Whether  an  act  does  or  does  not  accomplish  a 
given  purpose  would  seem  to  be  a  simple  enough 
matter,  and  theoretically  it  is  so.  There  is  at 
least  small  ground  for  discussion.  But  practi- 
cally it  takes  no  Httle  wit  to  recognize  whether 
our  ventures  do  in  the  deepest  sense  carry  or 
miscarry.  It  is  sometimes  a  hard  matter  to  know 
quite  honestly  whether  we  have  succeeded  or 
failed.  The  mills  of  the  gods  grind  slowly.  The 
harvest  may  be  so  slow  in  coming  that  we  do  not 
live  to  see  it,  or  of  such  a  nature  that  we  fail  to 
comprehend  it,  or  so  obscured  by  other  interests 
that  we  cannot  recognize  it.  The  apparent  fail- 
ure turns  out  to  be  success,  and  the  victory  we 
are  about  to  grasp  becomes  defeat. 

63 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

So  frequent  and  baffling  are  these  inversions 
that  in  the  language  of  poetry  and  mysticism 
they  are  often  accepted  permanently.  The  de- 
feated man  comforts  himself  with  the  thought 
that  after  all  he  has  somehow  or  other  succeeded. 
It  is  a  frequent  device,  even  of  those  who  wish  to 
report  life  soberly,  the  device  of  representing  an 
unsuccessful  quest  after  one  good  as  something 
quite  successful  and  praiseworthy  because  it  hap- 
pens to  land  one  at  some  unforeseen  minor  good. 
So  failure  is  praised,  and  drudgery  is  blessed, 
and  the  imperfect  is  glorified,  and  much  else  is 
done  to  break  down  in  our  minds  the  recogni- 
tion of  cause  and  effect,  and  the  sane  distinc- 
tion between  victory  and  defeat.  Even  the  most 
robust  of  our  English  poets  sings  with  such  note 
of  exultation  that  on  all  sides  it  is  quoted  with 
approval :  — 

"  What  I  aspired  to  be,  and  was  not,  comforts  me." 

Heaven  knows  that  in  the  many  vicissitudes  of 
life  we  must  seize  these  consolations  for  all  they 
are  worth,  —  and  they  have  a  real  value  both  as 
a  promise  of  victory  in  the  future  and  a  help  in 
the  present,  —  but  we  make  a  grave  mistake  if 
we  apply  them  to  our  pain,  not  as  a  soothing 
ointment,  but  as  a  veritable  cure. 

The  healthy-minded  man  may  get  things 
tangled  sometimes,  or  even  often,  but  to  retain 

64 


EFFICIENCY 


his  healthy-mindedness,  and  not  be  won  over  to 
the  region  of  sick  souls,  victory  must  still  mean 
victory,  and  defeat,  defeat.  The  world,  too, 
makes  gross  mistakes,  blunders  outrageously,  but 
in  the  long  run,  the  run  of  the  centuries,  it  keeps 
the  act  straight,  and  calls  successful  the  things 
that  are  successful. 

The  emphasis  of  moral  judgment  is  seldom 
placed  by  modern  moralists  upon  this  first  aspect 
of  right  conduct,  the  accomplishment  of  what  we 
set  out  to  accomplish.  And  they  have  neglected 
it,  in  spite  of  the  explicit  words  of  such  master 
moralists  as  Jesus  and  Buddha,  —  By  their  fruits 
ye  shall  know  them ;  That  which  ye  sow,  ye 
reap. 

But  we  seekers  after  good  fortune  cannot  af- 
ford to  neglect  efficiency.  We,  too,  must  count 
the  had  son  who  said  he  would  not,  and  did, 
better  than  the  good  son  who  said  he  would, 
and  did  not.  In  a  word,  when  we  come  to  look  at 
morals  with  a  view  to  getting  some  help  out  of 
them,  we  see  that  the  first  requisite  of  morality  is 
efficiency.  It  is  not  enough  to  propose  good  ends : 
we  must  so  adjust  our  means  that  the  desired 
ends  are  realized. 

With  the  human  heart  still  beating  true,  and 
God  still  in  his  world,  I  have  myself  no  expec- 
tation of  being  saved  by  anything  so  little  con- 
temporary  as   bygone  texts,  but  it  has  always 

65 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

seemed  to  me  profoundly  significant  that  in  his 
dramatic  allegory  of  the  great  day  of  judgment, 
an  allegory  impressive  through  its  very  simplicity, 
Jesus  placed  the  entire  emphasis  upon  action,  — 
not  upon  belief,  not  upon  good  intention,  but 
upon  ef&ciency.  The  blessed  ones  are  those  who 
rendered  the  service,  —  not  those  who  meant  to 
render  it,  or  would  have  liked  to  render  it,  or 
were  prevented  from  rendering  it.  And  Paul, 
rugged  and  unregenerate  as  he  was  in  many 
ways,  reflects  the  same  saving  grace  when  he 
defines  true  religion  before  God  and  the  Father, 
not  as  some  hidden  belief  of  the  heart,  some  idle 
sentiment,  but  as  applied  moraHty,  —  social  ser- 
vice and  individual  integrity.  And  James  has 
the  same  strenuous  regard  for  good  deeds. 

To  be  practical,  that  is,  to  succeed,  is  not  a 
mere  worldly  and  prudential  maxim.  It  is  the 
first  half  of  the  moral  life.  From  the  standpoint 
of  the  individual,  it  becomes  an  imperative  duty 
to  succeed,  to  make  life  efficient  and  telling. 
From  the  wholly  impersonal  standpoint  of  morals, 
it  is  equally  essential  to  succeed.  Conduct  which 
fails  to  carry  out  its  purpose,  which  is  imprac- 
ticable, which  lacks  efficiency,  which  stumbles 
in  the  adjustment  of  means  to  ends,  is  distinctly 
immoral,  for  it  either  makes  directly  against 
human  welfare,  or  at  least  fails  to  further  human 
welfare. 

66 


EFFICIENCY 


Evolution  lays  the  same  stress  upon  efficiency. 
The  degree  of  development  in  any  organism  is 
measured  by  the  nicety  with  which  it  adjusts 
means  to  ends.  The  vertebrates  stand  highest  in 
the  scale  of  life,  not  because  there  is  any  occult 
virtue  in  a  backbone,  but  because  animals  so 
equipped  possess  the  greatest  mastery  over  their 
environment,  and  are  capable  of  the  most  pur- 
poseful activity.  The  jelly-fish  may  possess  a 
wealth  of  purpose,  a  treasure-house  of  good  in- 
tention, that  would  stagger  even  a  German  meta- 
physician, but  science  classifies  the  jelly-fish  for 
the  purposes  it  does  make  manifest,  for  its  actual 
adjustments  of  means  to  ends,  and  these  being 
meagre,  the  rank  is  lowly.  Human  conduct  is 
ranked  in  the  same  way.  It  sweeps  over  a  wide 
range  of  quality,  from  activity  with  small  pur- 
pose, and  that  but  partially  reahzed,  to  activity 
rich  in  purpose  and  attainment.  Science  calls 
the  one  conduct  Httle  evolved,  and  the  other  con- 
duct highly  evolved.  The  most  highly  evolved 
conduct  we  count  the  most  moral,  because  in  it 
there  is  the  most  efficient  adjustment  of  means 
to  the  most  far-reaching  ends,  and  this  union  of 
efficiency  and  worth  makes  for  the  highest 
manifestation  of  life,  for  the  largest  measure  of 
welfare. 

But  moral  judgment  has  to  do  with  worth  as 
well  as  efficiency,  and  however  highly  one  may 

67 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

be  disposed  to  praise  efficiency,  one  must  not  for- 
get that  it  is  a  partial  constituent  of  morality 
and  not  the  whole  measure  of  the  law.  If  effi- 
ciency were  all,  a  young  and  vigorous  jelly-fish, 
performing  its  adjustments  to  simple  ends  with 
a  high  degree  of  perfection,  would  outrank  an 
aging  vertebrate  performing  its  adjustments  to 
more  compHcated  ends  with  relatively  less  per- 
fection. This  mistake  in  classification  is  some- 
times made,  not  indeed  with  respect  to  jelly-fish 
and  vertebrate,  but  with  respect  to  human  con- 
duct and  to  men.  In  moments  of  discourage- 
ment, when  the  Weltschmerz  presses  home,  one 
is  tempted  to  turn  to  the  lowly,  to  the  men  of 
simple  peasant  nature,  who  propose  relatively 
minor  ends  and  attain  them,  and  is  tempted  to 
ascribe  to  this  little  evolved  conduct  a  far  higher 
moral  value  than  is  ascribed  to  the  relatively  less 
efficient  conduct  of  men  who  set  up  more  com- 
phcated  and  far-reaching  ends  and  attain  them 
less  completely.  This  attitude  is  seen  in  Tolstoy 
and  Maeterlinck,  and  in  a  host  of  smaller  disci- 
ples and  imitators.  It  is  the  mistake  of  pairing 
off  relative  efficiency  against  a  much  more  solid 
total  attainment.  In  such  moods  as  this,  the  in- 
sistence of  the  poets  upon  the  value  of  unful- 
filled ideals  is  a  thoroughly  wholesome  correc- 
tive. One  would  prefer  to  strike  for  Heaven  and 
make  only  a  few  steps  on  the  journey,  rather  than 

68 


EFFICIENCY 


to  set  out  for  Hoboken  and  get  there.  But  the 
fact  remains  that  it  would  have  been  still  better 
to  have  made  Heaven. 

The  content  of  morality  may  well  be  repre- 
sented by  the  product  of  two  factors,  efficiency 
and  worth.  It  is  a  narrow  territory,  an  activity 
of  but  limited  value,  if  only  one  of  these  factors 
is  sizable.  That  kingdom  which  we  have  desig- 
nated as  good  fortune  requires  that  both  dimen- 
sions have  maofnitude. 

The  question  of  efficiency  is  still  further 
wrapped  up  in  the  question  of  ends,  since  it  is 
only  in  relation  to  these  that  we  can  determine 
efficiency.  It  may  seem,  indeed,  like  putting  the 
cart  before  the  horse,  to  consider  efficiency  be- 
fore ends.  The  only  excuse  for  doing  so  is  that 
of  the  two  factors  of  morality  it  is  the  less  com- 
plex, and  as  the  more  neglected  factor  it  deserves 
the  emphasis  of  first  mention.  In  attempting  to 
form  a  moral  estimate  of  any  line  of  conduct,  one 
must  clearly  distinguish  the  goal,  not  only  to  get 
at  the  total  content  of  the  action,  but  also  as  a  very 
first  requisite  in  measuring  the  efficiency.  Mor- 
als touch  our  feelings  and  prejudices  so  keenly, 
are  so  fundamental  a  part  of  what  we  conceive 
to  be  the  public  good,  that  probably  in  no  other 
department  of  thought  are  we  guilty  of  so  hasty 
and  inconsiderate  judgments.  This  defect  is  in- 
creased by  the  fact  that  no  matter  how  trans- 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

parent  a  life  may  be,  its  inner  ends  and  purposes, 
if  alien  to  our  own,  are  largely  hidden.  It  re- 
quires rare  tact  to  discover  even  one's  own  deeper 
self,  still  rarer  tact  to  put  the  finger  on  the 
mainspring  of  another's  life.  What  we  see  is  the 
outer  act,  and  indeed  only  a  portion  of  that. 
What  we  infer  is  the  inner  motive.  But  the 
neighbor  is  not  always  consistent,  —  the  inner 
motive  may  shift,  the  outer  act  may  be  but  an 
imperfect  manifestation  of  it.  Nor  are  we  always 
logical  in  drawing  our  conclusions.  And  so  the 
practical  difficulty  of  saying  whether  a  life  is 
successful  or  not,  even  from  the  bare  standpoint 
of  efficiency,  is  heightened  by  our  common  failure 
to  apprehend  its  purpose. 

We  aU  know  many  gentle  and  delightful  souls 
who  seem  to  us  so  singularly  unpractical  that 
the  erecting  of  success  into  a  duty  sounds  like  a 
harsh  programme.  But  it  may  well  be  that  these 
delightful  persons  are  not  really  unpractical,  but 
are  merely  neglecting  certain  ends  which  the 
world  at  large  sets  great  store  upon,  in  order  to 
grasp  ends  vastly  more  important.  Here  there 
has  been  no  failure  in  efficiency.  The  smaller 
ends  have  been  deliberately  passed  over  in  order 
to  reach  the  greater  ends.  In  a  commercial 
age,  where  money  represents  success,  a  neg- 
lect of  money-making  schemes  stamps  a  man  as 
highly  unpractical.     This  is  the  popular  verdict. 

70 


EFFICIENCY 


But  to  St.  Francis,  wealth  was  the  illusion,  and 
poverty  the  real  success.  To  Jesus,  it  was  the 
kingdom  of  God  and  his  righteousness  that  con- 
stituted the  major  concern.  Without  this  key, 
his  life  seemed  to  his  contemporaries  a  tragic 
failure. 

The  man  who  does  not  want  to  go  to  Congress, 
who  is  not  concerned  about  money-making,  who 
is  indifferent  to  family  life  and  big  houses,  must 
not  be  adjudged  a  failure  because  he  does  not 
attain  these  things.  We  may  have  our  own 
opinion  about  him,  and  praise  or  blame  his  taste, 
but  this  does  not  lay  him  open  to  the  charge  of 
inefficiency.  He  may  be  pursuing  ends  of  his 
own  with  a  high  degree  of  success,  ends  which 
we  have  not  the  insight  to  recognize  are  vastly 
more  important  than  those  more  obvious  ends 
which  he  has  deliberately  chosen  to  ignore. 

This  inwardness  of  motive,  this  obscurity  of 
the  ends  of  conduct,  makes  it  extremely  difficult 
to  render  righteous  judgment  in  the  matter  of 
efficiency,  and  almost  impossible  to  pass  judg- 
ment upon  persons.  Happily  we  are  freed  by 
our  own  explicit  disclaimer  from  attempting  the 
latter.  The  real  judge  to  whom  we  are  con- 
stantly appealing  is  the  liver  of  the  life,  and  he, 
if  any  one,  knows  the  underlying  motive.  Look- 
ing at  his  purpose,  and  then  quite  honestly 
at  his  performance,  he  must  know  in  his  own 

71 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

consciousness  whether  he  has  carried  it  out,  or 
failed.  The  cynics  of  the  world  take  pleasure  in 
making  these  comparisons,  in  picturing  the  youth 
fresh  from  college  and  flushed  with  high  hope, 
and  then  some  years  later,  the  same  youth  grown 
old,  bent  down  by  expediency  and  marked  by 
bitter  disappointment.  It  is  the  same  attitude 
that  so  far  takes  failure  as  a  foregone  conclu- 
sion that  it  finds  a  grim  humor  in  all  youthful 
hopes  and  baccalaureate  aspirations.  Even  Tho- 
reau,  moderately  healthy-minded  as  he  is,  gives 
voice  to  what  is  evidently  a  deliberate  conviction 
when  he  says  that  most  men  begin  collecting  the 
materials  for  a  palace,  and  end  by  building  a 
hut.  This,  too,  is  the  burden  of  that  deeper 
pessimism  which  not  only  finds  this  pitiable  gap 
between  purpose  and  performance  a  probability, 
but  declares  the  failure  inevitable  and  necessary. 
Youth  is  the  time  for  illusions ;  age,  the  time  for 
discovering  the  essential  nothingness  behind  the 
mask  of  appearances.  This,  the  world  over,  is  the 
hopeless  verdict  of  the  inefficient,  the  unsuccess- 
ful. It  is  also  at  times  the  verdict  of  the  efficient, 
the  successful  people  of  the  world,  the  people 
who  gain  their  ends,  only  to  find  that  the  ends 
themselves  were  unworthy.  But  this  only  em- 
phasizes the  fact  that  morality  has  to  do  with 
both  means  and  ends. 

This  despairing  mood,  this  sense  of  actual  and 

72 


EFFICIENCY 


inevitable  failure,  comes  to  every  man,  even  the 
sunniest  of  us,  on  occasion,  and  stains  life  with  its 
days  of  gloom.  It  is  the  habitual  mood  of  those 
whom  Professor  James  and  others  have  called 
the  sick  souls.  But  such  a  mood  is  unwhole- 
some and  unnecessary,  and  for  that  matter,  thor- 
oughly unmanly.  It  is  the  mood  of  the  suicide, 
a  mood  to  be  fought  with  the  same  vigor  that 
one  would  fight  typhoid  or  malaria.  Doubtless 
the  sense  of  failure,  in  the  presence  of  failure, 
is  entirely  chastening.  One  must  look  the  truth 
squarely  in  the  face.  But  the  point  is  as  to 
whether  one  regards  the  failure  as  inevitable. 
If  one  does,  then  it  seems  to  me  that  one  gives 
over  the  principle  of  cause  and  effect,  and  quite 
allows  the  world  to  go  to  the  devil.  But  if  one 
does  not  regard  the  failure  as  inevitable,  then 
defeat  and  despair  are  pitiably  weak.  The  bet- 
ter mood  is  an  amiable  defiance,  a  refusal  to  be 
downed. 

The  experience  of  life  really  justifies  this  lat- 
ter mood,  this  mood  of  amiable  defiance.  Let  us 
admit  that  there  are  thousands  of  failures.  Let 
us  accept  all  the  data  of  pessimism,  and  blink  not 
a  single  black  item.  It  is  also  true  that  there  are 
scores  of  successes.  The  company  may  be  small, 
but  there  are  assuredly  those  who  have  gone 
in  quest  of  good  fortune,  and  have  found  it. 
There  are  those  who  have  seized  upon  the  idea  of 

73 


THE    CHILDREN   OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

the  splendor  of  life,  and  have  realized  it.  What 
is  possible  to  one  is  possible  to  all.  The  essential 
thing  is  to  discover  the  method  of  good  fortune, 
not  a  difficult  matter,  since  by  its  very  definition 
the  moral  law  offers  the  one  possible  and  neces- 
sary method.  But  the  method  is  strenuous,  and 
the  law  itself  as  implacable  as  gravitation,  as 
passionless,  as  inevitable.  I  believe  myself  that 
it  is  practically  possible  for  every  one  to  achieve 
good  fortune,  absolute  good  fortune,  if  he  be 
normally  sound,  relative  good  fortune,  if  he  be 
handicapped.  The  way  to  go  about  it  is  precisely 
the  same  way  that  successful  engineers  build 
successful  bridges,  by  a  knowledge  of  material 
and  forces,  of  matter  and  motion,  and  by  a  sound 
application  of  the  knowledge. 

It  seems  to  me  wholesome  throughout  such  a 
quest  as  this  to  remember  that  the  first  half  of 
moral  judgment  turns  wholly  upon  efficiency,  and 
is  the  most  practical  application  of  cause  and 
effect.  Was  the  end  gained,  or  was  it  not?  Saints 
and  sinners,  ascetics  and  sensualists,  patriots  and 
traitors,  are,  to  that  extent,  moral  or  immoral 
in  just  the  measure  of  their  success.  Moral  con- 
demnation falls  upon  conduct  which  does  not 
carry  out  its  own  purpose,  which  fails  to  adjust 
means  to  ends,  the  sort  of  conduct  which  makes 
a  knave  doubly  a  knave  for  his  very  failure  to 

be  knavish,   and   sends   the  would-be   saint  to 

J 

74 


EFFICIENCY 


purgatory  over  the  paving-stones  of  good  inten- 
tion. 

The  sturdier  part  of  popular  judgment  agrees 
with  this  sturdier  aspect  of  morality.  A  school- 
boy may  propose  an  extremely  silly  stunt,  but  in 
the  opinion  of  his  comrades  it  is  '  up  to  him '  to 
do  it  well.  The  world  holds  a  similar  view.  Com- 
mon-sense may  condemn  the  complete  perform- 
ance, but  in  our  more  generous  and  more  manly 
moods  we  are  all  disposed  to  give  the  devil  his 
due.  Morality,  too,  does  this,  grants  the  excel- 
lence of  the  adjustments,  even  while  it  points  out 
the  worthlessness  of  the  ends. 

In  saying  all  this,  we  do  not  join  in  the  apo- 
theosis of  force,  do  not  shout  with  Kipling  over 
imperialism,  or  add  our  dipperful  of  praise  to  the 
exploits  of  Napoleon.  But  what  we  do  say  is  that 
practical  force  and  efficiency,  the  habit  of  success, 
is  an  essential  and  inexpugnable  element  of  the 
moral  life.  To  speak  thus  is  to  open  a  window 
to  the  cool  and  bracing  west  wind  of  endeavor, 
and  to  beg  the  soul  to  be  satisfied  with  no  cheap 
and  sentimental  victories.  I  demand  of  myself, 
not  that  I  shall  want  to  be  good,  —  a  mere  baby 
prank,  —  but  that  I  shall  he  good,  fit  adventure; 
for  a  man. 

One  may  not  end,  for  the  time,  even  so  brief 
a  survey  of  efficiency  without  considering  two  at- 
titudes of  mind  which  frequently  interfere  with 

75 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

its  just  measurement,  and  these  attitudes  are 
modesty  and  humility.  They  are  commonly  rated 
as  virtues,  and  by  many  as  virtues  of  the  first 
order.  They  are  nearly  synonymous.  If  we 
take  them  to  mean  a  just  estimate  of  one's  self, 
neither  too  much  nor  too  little,  they  are  simple 
honesty,  and  we  have  no  need  either  for  the 
terms  or  for  the  unreal  distinctions.  But  modesty 
and  humility  are  not  commonly  so  used.  To 
say  that  a  man  is  honest  with  himself  is  to  give 
him  high  praise  in  the  matter  of  both  insight 
and  good-will.  But  to  say  that  he  is  modest  or 
humble  is  commonly  to  credit  him  with  admit- 
ted under-estimation  of  himself.  He  is  so  very 
honest  that  he  is  dishonest.  As  the  opposites  of 
those  ugly  qualities,  arrogance  and  pretension, 
modesty  and  humility  have  a  relative  value,  — 
are  good  by  comparison  with  something  worse ; 
but  that  is  all  that  one  can  say  for  them.  In  the 
clear,  truth-loving  eyes  of  morality,  the  less  bad 
is  never  counted  as  good.  In  the  normal  affairs  of 
life,  it  is  a  universal  experience  that  truth  makes 
for  human  welfare,  and  is  therefore  moral ;  while 
falsehood  makes  against  human  welfare,  and  is 
therefore  immoral.  There  is  no  valid  argument 
for  making  an  exception  in  the  matter  of  self- 
estimation.  It  is  still  of  the  first  importance  to 
be  honest.  '  Neither  too  much  nor  too  little,'  is 
the  moral  requirement. 

76 


EFFICIENCY 


In  the  practical  attempt  to  reach  right  con- 
duct, this  dishonesty  with  the  virtuous  mien,  this 
sickly  trick  of  disguises,  is  a  veritable  stumbling- 
block.  The  man  who  cannot  frankly  and  hon- 
estly recognize  success  cannot  be  trusted  to 
recognize  failure.  I  write  a  great  many  poor 
sentences ;  occasionally  I  write  a  good  one.  If  I 
cannot,  or  will  not,  recognize  the  good  sentence 
when  I  meet  it  face  to  face  in  my  own  manu- 
script, I  shall  soon  cease  to  recognize  the  poor 
ones.  Most  probably  I  shall  end  by  believing 
that  all  my  sentences  are  good,  and  that  it  is 
only  my  excessive  modesty  that  makes  them  seem 
poor.  This  is  indeed  the  fate  of  many  a  modest 
man.  He  makes  such  over-allowance  for  his  own 
Ufider-estimsition  that  modesty  quite  defeats  itself, 
and  right  judgment  is  out  of  the  question.  It 
takes  an  extremely  clever  person  to  toy  with 
dishonesty,  and  not  in  the  end  get  worsted. 

In  our  western  art,  modesty  is  usually  repre- 
sented as  a  veiled  face,  a  draped  figure,  as  if 
there  were  something  indecorous  and  unseemly 
in  the  truth.  It  is  a  symbol  that  stands  for  the 
modesty  of  both  person  and  conduct.  It  is  some- 
thing hidden.  I  like  the  frank  nakedness  of  the 
Greeks  better,  the  fearless  truthfulness  with  which 
her  philosophers  sought  to  measure  both  excel- 
lence and  defect.  Morality  demands  the  same 
openness,  and  demands  it  imperatively.  The  quest 

77 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

is  not  foj*  those  who  close  the  eyes  either  to  wel- 
come or  unwelcome  truth. 

Over  against  modesty  and  humihty  stand  their 
ugly  opposites,  arrogance  and  pretension.  But 
morality  has  as  little  commerce  with  the  one  as 
with  the  other.  What  morality  demands  is  that 
a  man  shall  be  honest,  shall  recognize  without 
affectation  such  small  excellence  as  is  rightly  his, 
and  shall  acknowledge  without  self-deception  and 
evasion  the  large  imperfections,  the  many  fail- 
ures, which  inevitably  come  to  light  when  moral 
criticism  reviews  his  conduct.  I  am  here  so  much 
insisting  upon  these  points  because  the  bravest 
of  us,  the  most  unflinchingly  truthful,  may  well 
cry  out  for  mercy,  and  shrink  back,  when  the 
calm,  passionless  measuring-rod  of  morality  is 
applied  with  scientific  precision  to  that  assem- 
blage of  conduct  and  quality  and  motive  which 
constitutes  the  self.  For  under  all  our  discus- 
sion there  must  run  this  one  assumption,  that 
moral  judgment  has  to  do  with  what  is,  has  to  do 
with  human  activity  as  it  finds  it,  —  not  in  church, 
on  parade,  but  in  the  house  and  street  and 
market-place,  —  and  does  not  in  the  least  concern 
itself  with  what  are  commonly  called  extenuat- 
ing circumstances.  To  remain  scientific,  morality 
must  be  a  sort  of  thermometer,  unemotionally 
registering  the  moral  temperature.  Our  own  per- 
sonal attitude  towards  conduct  is  largely  influ- 

78 


EFFICIENCY 


enced  by  considerations  of  circumstance.  If  we 
are  charitable,  we  ^rnake  allowances/  as  the 
phrase  goes,  for  those  who  are  sorely  pressed; 
but  morality  does  not  and  cannot.  As  we  have 
been  saying,  morality  concerns  itself  solely  with 
performance.  Human  sympathy  very  properly 
deals  with  effort  and  motive,  accepts  them,  ex- 
cuses the  deficiencies  for  which  they  are  the 
proffered  substitutes,  and  hopes  for  better  things 
in  the  future.  But  morality,  in  measuring  conduct, 
makes  as  little  comment  as  does  the  yardstick 
which  proclaims  a  man  tall  or  short.  A  virtuous 
man  is  one  who  is  whole,  not  one  who  tries  to 
be  whole.  We  may  respect  the  man  who  tries, 
but  we  obscure  his  vision,  as  well  as  our  own,  if 
we  mistake  the  effort  after  virtue  for  virtue. 
One  may  have  had  in  youth  no  apparent  oppor- 
tunity to  gain  an  education,  and  in  consequence 
may  display  throughout  the  rest  of  life  the  hide- 
ousness  of  uninformed  conduct.  Morality  pro- 
nounces only  upon  the  hideousness.  One  may 
have  inherited  a  deficient  organism,  and  go 
through  life  an  invalid  in  mind  and  body.  Mo- 
rality pronounces  only  upon  the  weakness. 

This  is  Spartan  doctrine.  It  takes  a  brave 
soul  to  invite  so  calm  and  pitiless  an  inspection 
of  the  inner  life,  thus  to  pass  in  review  his  tat- 
tered garments  before  the  eye  of  the  Eternal. 
But  through  no  other  gate  can  the  path  toward 

79 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

perfection  be  reached.  This  calm,  pitiless,  pene- 
trating scrutiny  of  human  conduct  has  about  it 
the  immense  strength  of  the  things  that  are 
absolutely  honest. 

This  fearless  way  of  regarding  conduct,  one's 
own  as  well  as  another's,  precludes  all  attitudi- 
nizing, whether  the  less-than-the-truth  of  humil- 
ity, or  the  more  of  pretension.  The  student  and 
practitioner  of  morals  must  have  a  passion  for 
things  as  they  are.  And  if  this  flawless  honesty 
be  needed  in  estimating  that  simpler  half  of 
morality  which  we  have  called  efficiency,  still 
more  is  it  needed  in  considering  the  vastly  more 
complicated  questions  concerning  the  ends  of 
conduct,  that  other  half  of  morality  which  we 
have  called  worth. 


VI 
WORTH 

IT  seems  that  all  inquiries,  and  particularly  all 
moral  inquiries,  have  a  tendency  to  branch 
out  in  many  directions.  Morality,  as  we  have 
just  seen,  divides  at  once  into  efficiency  and 
worth.  It  is  possible  to  keep  efficiency  pretty 
much  of  a  unit,  though  hardly  possible  to  treat 
it  adequately  with  any  degree  of  brevity.  Effi- 
ciency presents  many  aspects  worthy  of  the 
most  careful  attention,  aspects  barely  touched 
upon  in  the  preceding  chapter,  and  not  easily 
exhausted.  When  one  writes  about  morality, 
one  writes  about  life,  and  by  that  very  fact  is 
doomed  to  be  fragmentary  and  inadequate. 

But  the  handling  of  efficiency  is  mere  prelimi- 
nary skirmishing  compared  to  the  almost  inter- 
minable vistas  which  present  themselves  at  the 
bare  mention  of  worth. 

We  have  at  the  outset  another  of  those  bi- 
sections of  which  we  have  just  spoken.  Life's 
purpose,  in  order  to  be  carried  out  at  all,  must 
appeal  to  the  individual  as  a  goal  worth  striving 
for,  as  the  good  fortune  which  his  heart  desires. 
But  life's  purpose,  in  order  to  be  moral,  must  also 
81 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

satisfy  those  objective  standards  of  conduct  which 
emerge  from  the  broader  experience  of  .the  race. 
In  calling  the  subjective  ends  of  conduct  good 
fortune,  —  the  goal  which  stirs  the  individual 
deeply  enough  to  keep  him,  day  after  day,  in 
vigorous  action,  —  and  in  calling  the  objective 
ends  of  conduct  social  welfare,  —  the  more  ab- 
stract standard  of  morality  which  corrects  and 
chastens  the  limited  experience  of  the  individual, 
—  we  have  not  only  a  division  which  is  conven- 
ient for  the  purposes  of  formal  exposition,  but 
more  significant  far,  a  division  which  supplies 
the  one  possible  key  to  the  solution  of  this  prob- 
lem of  worth. 

The  final  and  overpowering  interest  in  moral- 
ity depends,  as  I  have  tried  to  show  in  my  very 
title,  upon  the  subjective  side  of  morals,  upon 
individual  good  fortune.  What  healthy-minded 
men  and  women  care  about  is  immediate  and  per- 
sonal salvation,  the  art  of  right  conduct,  the  art 
of  successful  daily  living.  They  are  interested, 
not  so  much  to  set  up  some  abstract  standard  of 
morals,  which  by  its  ingenuity  shall  please  them- 
selves, if  no  one  else,  but  rather  to  help  on  the 
cause  of  concrete  morality,  the  practical  quest  of 
good  fortune.  And  yet,  as  soon  as  one  comes  to 
deal  with  the  problem  in  any  serious  way,  one 
sees  that  this  abstract  side  of  morals  conditions 
the  practical  quest  and  must  needs  have  adequate 

82 


WORTH 


study.  Reflection,  and  especially  reflection  upon 
the  cause  of  human  failure,  soon  suggests  that 
while  individual  good  fortune  is  the  supreme  end 
of  conduct,  it  is  an  end  too  frequently  missed. 
The  conviction  deepens  that  individual  good  for- 
tune is  the  result  of  very  definite  forces,  and  that 
the  quest,  in  order  to  be  intelligent  and  success- 
ful, must  recognize  these  forces  and  must  act  in 
harmony  with  their  requirements. 

To  want  good  fortune  is  one  thing ;  to  get  it 
is  another.  To  seek  good  fortune  momentarily 
and  on  impulse  might  be  said  to  be  the  method 
of  the  majority.  But  the  method  commonly  fails. 
It  fails  because  it  lacks  persistence,  that  is,  effi- 
ciency, and  because  it  is  founded  upon  the  very 
limited  experience  of  a  single  life.  The  individ- 
ual who  omits  to  chasten  his  personal  desires  by 
reference  to  that  larger  experience  gained  by  the 
race,  in  reality  omits  to  measure  his  idea  of  good 
fortune  by  those  valid  objective  standards  which 
establish  the  worth  of  the  idea.  This  less  per- 
sonal side  of  morality,  this  wholly  impersonal 
side,  by  which  human  conduct  is  objectively  and 
unemotionally  measured,  is  the  necessary  correc- 
tive of  individual  ignorance  and  eccentricity. 
In  saying,  then,  that  that  conduct  is  right  or  good 
which  promotes  human  welfare,  we  have  in  mind 
two  realities,  personal  welfare  and  social  welfare. 

To  know  good  fortune,  and  in  what  it  gen- 

83 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

uinely  consists,  one  must  know  what  welfare  in 
this  larger  sense  means,  and  must  be  able  and 
willing  to  measure  one's  desires  objectively  as 
well  as  subjectively. 

But  it  is  every  whit  as  essential  that  this  outer 
show  of  welfare  shall  honestly  mean  the  inner 
good  fortune.  When  morality  becomes  so  ab- 
stract and  formal  that  it  leaves  out  the  human 
heart  and  its  needs  and  desires,  it  passes  into  an 
arid  desert  where  there  is  no  longer  any  motive 
power  to  set  in  motion  the  machinery  of  con- 
duct. If  morality  part  company  with  experi- 
ence, it  grows  speculative  and  theoretical,  and 
finally  comes  to  propose  ends  for  conduct  not 
only  without  worth,  but  even  harmful.  Good 
fortune  and  social  welfare  are  both  of  them  mat- 
ters of  experience,  and  the  successful  student  of 
morals,  let  us  repeat,  must  needs  be  at  the  same 
time  a  practitioner.  It  is  grotesque  that  a  closet 
philosopher  should  ever  attempt  to  tell  the  world 
in  what  the  worth  of  conduct  consists. 

We  all  gladly  admit  the  intellectual  supremacy 
of  the  Greeks.  Yet  even  in  the  days  of  their 
prime,  one  is  struck  by  the  curious  feebleness 
in  their  handling  of  natural  events.  They  pre- 
ferred to  speculate  about  Nature,  to  think  out 
what  she  might  be,  or  could  be,  instead  of 
finding  out  experimentally  what  she  is.  As 
a  result,  we  have  a  series  of  poetic  but  eminently 

84 


WORTH 


childish  conceptions,  a  universe  composed  of  the 
four  elements  of  earth  and  air,  fire  and  water ; 
a  cosmogony  beginning  anywhere  and  ending 
nowhere.  Even  in  music,  which  receives  such 
frequent  mention  in  their  literature,  the  Greeks 
made  small  advance,  for  they  neglected  the  phy- 
sical basis  of  sound,  and  declined  the  one  source 
of  acoustic  knowledge,  experiment.  Even  in  mo- 
rality, we  are  struck  quite  as  much  by  what  the 
Greeks  failed  to  achieve  as  by  what  they  did 
actually  achieve.  They  sought  good  fortune 
with  rare  singleness  of  purpose ;  they  produced 
works  on  human  welfare  which  are  still  sources 
of  inspiration ;  but  the  greatest  of  their  moralists, 
Plato,  never  repudiated  human  slavery. 

Coming  much  nearer  home  in  both  country  and 
time,  we  find  the  same  tendency  to  speculate  upon 
the  worth  of  conduct,  instead  of  seeking  worth  in 
valid  human  experience.  Especially  in  Germany 
do  we  find  these  astronomers  who  have  never 
seen  the  stars.  In  Germany,  perhaps  more  than 
in  any  civilized  country,  do  we  find  professed 
teachers  leading  altogether  unnatural  and  artifi- 
cial lives.  There  is  something  almost  humorous 
in  Kant's  telling  us  in  what  the  worth  of  conduct 
consists,  —  Kant,  the  German  peasant,  who  never 
went  away  from  home,  who  lived  the  narrowest 
of  human  lives,  who  had  neither  wife  nor  chil- 
dren, who  could  not  brook  dissent  or  contradic- 

85 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

tion,  who  grew  more  dogmatic  with  each  year  of 
his  life.  There  is  something  unreal  and  uncon- 
vincing when  Schopenhauer  speaks.  One  must 
always  admire  the  high  accuracy  of  German  labo- 
ratory work,  but  in  the  more  social  sciences  it 
seems  to  be  a  land  of  half -digestion,  of  unassimi- 
lated  facts.  One  is  struck,  not  so  much  by  the 
boldness  of  her  speculation  as  by  its  unsoundness. 
To  discover  in  what  the  worth  of  conduct  genu- 
inely consists,  we  must  go  to  sincere  daily  life, 
to  experience.  If  we  fail  to  do  this,  we  make  the 
same  disastrous  mistake  that  the  Greeks  did  in 
their  handling  of  Nature  and  music,  and  we  get 
the  same  very  partial  results. 

The  point  is  that  while  worth  divides  in  this 
way,  the  two  branches  are  not  divergent,  but 
are  strictly  parallel,  and  are  bound  together  by 
a  series  of  intricate  cross-roads.  The  subjective 
side  of  worth,  good  fortune,  and  the  objective 
side,  social  welfare,  are  separate  aspects,  but  they 
must  needs  react  upon  each  other  constantly,  or 
the  thing  itself  —  worth  —  quite  evaporates  and 
becomes  a  speculative  illusion. 

Let  us  first  consider  the  subjective  side.  In 
turning  to  personal  experience,  we  find  some- 
thing so  complicated  and  bulky  that  one  at  least 
understands  the  temptation  to  substitute  specu- 
lation. Here  are  eighty  million  people  in  Amer- 
ica, and  uncounted  millions  elsewhere,  pursuing 

86 


WORTH 


more  or  less  successfully  ends  so  unlike  as  to  be 
contradictory  or  even  openly  antagonistic.  With 
China  and  Turkey  both  restive  to  do  things  that 
the  rest  of  the  world  is  bent  on  preventing ;  with 
the  Triple  Alliance  standing  for  one  thing  and 
the  balance  of  Europe  for  another ;  with  one  half 
of  America  hot  for  one  policy  and  the  other 
half  equally  hot  for  its  opposite ;  with  hundreds 
of  churches  offering  rival  paths  to  salvation,  and 
different  schools  of  medicine  rival  paths  to  health, 
and  a  heterogeneous  lot  of  schoolmasters  rival 
roads  to  culture ;  with  my  own  neighbors  so 
little  agreed  upon  the  right  that  the  town  judge 
must  decide  between  them ;  with  my  own  house- 
hold swayed  by  so  many  standards  that  only 
good-breeding  prevents  daily  clashings ;  with  my 
own  heart  subject  to  such  diverse  promptings 
that  I  am  not  one,  but  many  men,  it  is  very  clear 
that  the  seeker  after  the  true  ends  of  human  con- 
duct in  the  realm  of  experience  must  needs  have 
courage ;  and  the  finder  of  it,  more  wisdom  than 
is  given  to  most  of  us.  For  the  curious  thing 
about  this  many-sided  performance  is  that  the 
majority  of  these  people  are  doing  the  thing  that 
they  defend  as  right,  and  all  of  them  are  doing 
the  thing  which  they  regard  as  desirable.  It  is 
easy  to  pass  over  that  body  of  current  experi- 
ence which  we  are  pleased  to  believe  is  indicative 
of  less  highly  evolved  conduct  than  our  own,  but 

87 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

even  among  our  admitted  peers  and  our  grudg- 
ingly acknowledged  superiors,  there  is  such  wide 
diversity  in  the  proposed  ends  of  conduct  that 
the  boldest  of  us  is  whipped  into  some  sort  of 
caution  in  attempting  to  name  the  determinate 
goal,  the  highest  good.  Either  worth  in  conduct 
is  tricked  out  in  many  disgmses  and  hard  to 
recognize,  or  else  it  is  so  generous  a  possession 
that  only  one  drop  of  it  may  be  poured  into  the 
tiny  chalice  of  a  single  life. 

The  study  of  life,  the  major  study  in  the  cur- 
riculum of  the  moralist,  gives  ample  ground  for 
believing  that  both  these  conclusions  are  abun- 
dantly true,  and  that  both  are  significant.  One 
might  almost  say  that  good  fortune  differs  in 
degree  and  in  kind.  It  has  quite  as  many  faces  as 
we  were  disposed  in  the  Prologue  to  think  that  it 
had.  It  wears  a  multitude  of  masks.  But  deeper 
still  are  those  essential  differences  of  goal  which 
are  necessary  and  proper  to  beings  who  are  trav- 
eling, it  may  be,  in  the  same  general  direction, 
but  who  are,  at  any  given  time,  at  such  widely 
different  stages  of  the  journey.  The  history  of 
evolution  is  the  history  of  goals  attained  and 
passed  and  forgotten,  but  in  the  whole  chain  of 
events,  not  one  of  them  was  unnecessary,  from 
the  smallest  to  the  most  august. 

My  neighbor  does  not  have  to  do  what  I  do 
in  order  to  count  himself  fortunate,  —  for  which 

88 


WORTH 


I  am  thankful.  And  I  do  not  have  to  do  what 
he  does,  —  for  which  I  am  more  thankful.  Yet 
each  of  us,  taken  at  his  best,  is  needed  to  com- 
plete the  world.  It  may  be  that  I  am  blowing  a 
penny  whistle  compared  to  the  deep  bass  trum- 
pets of  the  gods,  but  I  shall  not,  on  that  account, 
throw  it  away  and  draw  out  of  the  game.  I  have 
all  the  fun  of  blowing,  and  though  they  may  not 
hear  me,  I  sometimes  hear  them ;  and  in  time, 
I  rather  expect  to  be  blowing  a  bigger  trumpet 
myself. 

If  we  have  any  openness  about  us,  any  whole- 
some flexibility  of  thought,  I  think  we  must 
come  very  genuinely  to  some  such  conclusion  as 
this,  that  good  fortune  is  essentially  and  radically 
varied,  and  would  be  distinctly  less  good  fortune, 
or  even  none  at  all,  if  it  were  possessed  of  uni- 
formity. It  would  be  unpardonable  egotism  to 
believe  for  a  moment  that  my  own  particular 
good  fortune  is  the  only  legitimate  good  fortune 
there  is.  I  may  reasonably  believe  that  the  goal 
I  set  for  myself,  and  on  the  whole  strive  for, 
bears  some  intimate  relation  to  my  nature  and  to 
its  needs.  But  the  same  reasoning  holds  in  regard 
to  my  neighbor.  From  the  world  point  of  view, 
as  well  as  from  that  of  the  individual,  it  is  the 
variety  and  the  immortal  freshness  that  give  to 
life  its  enduring  charm.  The  attempts  of  the 
older  moralists  to  turn  us  out  all  of  a  pattern,  to 

89 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

make  us  all  enamored  of  the  same  sort  of  bliss, 
have  met  with  quite  the  fate  that  they  deserved. 
These  older  pictures  of  a  static,  uniform  heaven, 
of  a  changeless,  monotonous  beyond,  are  as  dull 
as  anything  in  literature.  If  we  all  took  to  wear- 
ing crowns  and  to  harp-playing,  and  never  left 
off,  we  should  soon  reach  a  state  of  mind  in  which 
the  severest  drudgery  of  earth  would  seem  the 
utmost  of  good  fortune. 

But  in  spite  of  the  tremendous  diversity  in 
right  conduct,  which  we  not  only  discover  but 
count  precious,  the  thought  persists  that  there 
must  be  some  common  element  woven  into  this 
diversity  which  constitutes  the  quality  of  right- 
ness,  an  element  recognized  by  the  possessors 
of  these  various  types  of  good  fortune,  and  in 
reality  creating  their  community  of  satisfaction. 
The  something  which  constitutes  objective  worth 
in  human  conduct  must  be  something  which  not 
only  furthers  general  well-being,  but  at  the  same 
time  appeals  to  the  actors  in  the  drama  as  per- 
sonally desirable.  That  is  to  say,  worth  has  pri- 
marily this  subjective  side.  It  is  certainly  more 
accurate  historically  to  consider  the  good-fortune 
side  of  worth  before  the  more  abstract  social- 
welfare  side,  and  this  in  spite  of  the  fact  that 
austere  moralists  affect  to  despise  so  trivial  a 
thing  as  personal  satisfaction. 

If  worth  failed  to  promote  well-being,  it  would 

90 


WORTH 


long  since  have  been  lost  to  such  late-comers  as 
ourselves,  for  it  would  have  killed  off  the  pos- 
sessors of  worth,  and  raised  up  no  new  genera- 
tion. If  good  conduct  tended  to  kill  off  its  prac- 
titioners instead  of  conserving  them,  only  the 
bad  would  survive  on  the  earth,  and  the  good 
would  not  only  die  young,  but  more  fatal  still, 
would  soon  cease  even  to  be  born.  It  is  equally 
obvious  that  if  worth  were  so  occult  as  to  fail 
of  recognition  and  human  desire,  it  could  be  the 
object  of  no  human  striving.  If  worth  came  with- 
out this  hall-mark,  it  would  be  a  matter  of  pure 
accident  whether  a  man  were  good  or  bad,  and 
also  a  matter  of  pure  indifference,  since  neither 
the  man  nor  his  neighbors  could  at  all  discrim- 
inate. We  should  be  quite  helpless  pawns,  and 
morality  would  be  wholly  out  of  the  question. 

It  is  vitally  important  to  establish,  even  at  the 
cost  of  so  much  iteration,  that  worth  in  human 
conduct,  to  be  continuously  possible  and  signifi- 
cant, must  have  this  inner  witness,  this  testi- 
mony of  the  individual  spirit,  must  come  to  each 
one  of  us  in  the  subtle  guise  of  good  fortune, 
as  something  to  be  desired  and  worked  for.  The 
one  possible  end  of  conduct,  from  the  individual 
standpoint,  is  the  feeling  to  be  aroused  by  the 
conduct  itself.  To  be  inaugurated  and  persisted 
in,  the  conduct  must  produce  some  feeling  which 
the  individual  wishes  to  experience.    We  may 

91 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

properly  call  such  a  feeling  satisfaction,  or  grati- 
fication, or  happiness,  or  pleasure.  This  feeling 
is  the  primary  and  necessary  end  of  human  con- 
duct, the  thing  that  men  are  working  for  in  the 
present,  have  worked  for  in  the  past,  and  will 
work  for  in  the  future. 

It  is,  on  the  whole,  a  clarifying  reflection  that 
however  dissimilar  our  views  of  life,  we  are  all 
subject  to  the  same  inner  spring  of  action ;  we 
are  all  of  us  the  agents  of  the  heart's  desire. 
We  difPer  from  one  another,  not  because  some 
men  want  happiness  and  some  do  not,  but  wholly 
in  the  sort  of  happiness  that  we  want.  How 
entirely  true  this  is  will  appear  after  a  moment  of 
very  primary  psychological  reflection.  We  never 
do  anything  unless  we  want  to  do  it,  for  the 
simple  reason  that  we  cannot.  We  often  enough 
declare  to  the  contrary,  but  the  language  is  not 
accurate,  for  in  the  absence  of  the  desire  to  act, 
the  machinery  of  nerve  and  muscle  would  not 
operate.  It  is  of  course  true  that  we  often  want 
to  do  something  else,  but  under  the  given  circum- 
stances, we  evidently  want  to  do  it  less  than  the 
thing  that  we  actually  go  and  do.  Otherwise  we 
should  have  done  the  something  else.  One  is 
forced  to  do  a  thing,  even  a  fatal  thing,  such  as 
walking  the  gang-plank,  but  one  does  it  in  pre- 
ference to  accepting  the  still  more  terrible  alter- 
native with  which  it  is  paired.    We  do  a  thousand 

92 


WORTH 


things  which  abstractly  we  do  not  want  to  do, 
—  which,  taken  out  of  relation  to  their  context, 
no  sane  man  would  think  of  doing,  —  and  do 
them  voluntarily,  because  their  alternatives  are 
still  less  acceptable.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  then,  we 
do  them  because  we  want  to  do  them.  We  may 
quite  easily  wish  the  circumstance  otherwise,  but 
the  circumstance  being  what  it  is,  the  thing  we 
do  is  necessarily  the  thing  we  want  to  do.  And 
this  is  universally  true,  a  judgment  which  holds 
of  all  men  in  all  time. 

This  fundamental  and  necessary  proposition, 
that  one  cannot  do  what  one  does  not  want  to  do, 
or  that  one  can  only  do  what  one  wants  to  do,  is 
commonly  denied  or  ignored,  partly,  as  we  have 
just  seen,  because  events  seemingly  refute  it,  and 
partly  because  the  reverse  of  the  proposition  is 
not  true.  It  is  not  true  that  one  can  do,  in  every 
case,  what  one  wants  to  do.  This  might  be  true 
if,  by  some  inscrutable  decree,  the  desires  of  the 
human  heart  were  limited  to  the  region  of  the 
possible.  But  we  know  that  this  is  not  the  case. 
We  know  that  all  along  the  line  of  human  en- 
deavor, from  the  baby  reaching  out  its  hand  for 
the  moon  to  the  most  sedate  of  life's  adventurers, 
we  are  constantly  running  up  against  the  impos- 
sible. So  much  is  possible  to  those  who  are  in 
earnest,  to  the  men  who  sincerely  believe,  that 
we  have  in  our  midst  a  company  of  generous  en- 

93 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

thusiasts  who  are  quite  ready  to  declare  that  all 
things  are  possible.  It  is  a  delicate  matter  to 
draw  the  line  between  the  possible  and  the  im- 
possible. To  bring  the  ends  of  conduct  too  near 
is  to  be  guilty  of  the  immorality  of  the  second- 
best,  to  build  the  hut  instead  of  the  palace.  To 
place  the  ends  of  conduct  too  far  off,  in  the 
impossible,  is  to  rule  out  efficiency,  and  by  thus 
depriving  morality  of  one  of  its  essential  factors, 
to  rob  it  of  all  content. 

We  may  say,  then,  in  general,  that  the  subjec- 
tive worth  of  conduct  lies  in  its  power  to  produce 
human  happiness. 

To  define  the  end  of  conduct  as  perfection,  or 
virtue,  or  blessedness,  is  thought  by  some  to  be 
a  morality  of  sterner  fibre,  and  these  impressive 
terms  do  warm  the  unreflective  heart  into  an 
agreeable  state  of  moral  enthusiasm,  but  in  reality 
they  are  not  sufficiently  elementary  to  serve  as 
an  adequate  measuring-rod.  Perfection  is  only 
a  more  attractive  name  for  efficiency ;  virtue  is 
the  possession  of  something  still  to  be  defined  ; 
blessedness  is  a  state  which  needs  much  further 
description  before  it  can  be  erected  into  a  practi- 
cal end  of  conduct.  The  true  subjective  end  must 
be  a  simple  feeling,  one  primitive  enough  and  mas- 
terful enough  to  set  in  motion  the  machinery  of 
conduct,  and  universal  enough  to  account  for 
universal  human  striving. 

94 


WORTH 


It  is  not  well-being,  but  the  sense  of  well- 
being,  that  the  individual  is  reaching  out  after. 
That  constitutes  his  good  fortune.  And  for  this 
sense  of  well-being,  this  brooding  satisfaction,  the 
simple  word  ^  happiness '  seems  the  most  appropri- 
ate and  fitting.  Morality  criticises  the  desires  of 
the  human  heart  and  the  conduct  which  springs 
from  those  desires,  measuring  them  both  in  terms 
of  their  happiness-producing  results.  Conduct 
which  produces  happiness  is  good.  Conduct 
which  produces  more  happiness  is  better.  Con- 
duct which  produces  most  happiness  is  best  of 
all.  We  might,  indeed,  end  our  inquiry  into 
worth  at  this  point,  if  the  uninstructed  human 
heart  knew  in  what  happiness  really  consists. 
But  this  narrower  personal  ideal  of  happiness  re- 
quires, as  we  have  seen,  the  corrective  of  a  larger 
experience,  the  ideal  of  social  welfare,  before  it 
can  be  accepted  by  morality  as  the  true  end  of 
conduct,  before  it  can  be  said  to  possess  worth. 

Few  standards  proposed  by  moralists  for  the 
proper  end  of  conduct  have  been  so  severely 
criticised  and  so  roundly  abused  as  just  this 
simple  and  unavoidable  standard  of  human  hap- 
piness. Carlyle  called  it,  in  his  characteristic  way, 
a  'pig  philosophy,'  under  the  apparent  impres- 
sion that  the  happiness  pigs  are  presumably  after 
is  the  only  sort  of  happiness  which  the  universe 
provides.    It  has  been  discredited  as  a  low  sort 

95 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

of  prudence,  something  much  below  the  severe 
mountain  heights  of  legitimate  morality.  It  has 
been  arraigned  as  the  poor-spirited  scheme  of 
a  pleasure-loving  people  to  cheat  pain  out  of  its 
due  harvest  among  the  children  of  men,  — '  Let 
us  eat,  drink,  and  be  merry,  for  to-morrow  we 
die.'  It  has  been  held  up  to  scorn  as  compar- 
ing most  unfavorably  with  more  ascetic  rules  of 
life.  The  vocabulary  of  abuse  has  been  well-nigh 
spent  upon  it.  In  our  more  austere  moments, 
pleasure  appears  as  the  favorite  bait  of  the 
Father  of  Lies  when  he  goes  angling  after  poor 
human  souls. 

We  tried  to  show,  in  the  chapter  on  Right  and 
Wrong,  that  experience  is  not  only  the  basis 
and  source  of  morality,  but  that  in  spite  of  all 
contrary  and  supercilious  assertion,  it  is  the  only 
practical  basis  and  source.  When  we  come  to 
examine  other  systems  of  morality  with  respect 
to  their  proposed  ends  of  conduct,  we  find  signi- 
ficantly enough  that  the  ultimate  goal  is  not  only 
expressed  in  terms  of  happiness,  but  is  necessarily 
so  expressed.  The  difference  is  solely  in  the  sort 
of  happiness,  and  in  the  time  when  it  is  claimed. 
This  agreement  in  ultimate  purpose  finds  vivid 
expression  in  The  Data  of  Ethics  :  '  No  school 
can  avoid  taking  for  the  ultimate  moral  aim  a 
desirable  state  of  feeling  called  by  whatever  name, 
—  gratification,  enjoyment,  happiness.    Pleasure 

96 


WORTH 


somewhere,  at  some  time,  to  some  being  or  beings 
is  an  inexpugnable  element  of  the  conception. 
It  is  as  much  a  necessary  form  of  moral  intui- 
tion as  space  is  a  necessary  form  of  intellectual 
intuition.' 

To  acknowledge  happiness  as  the  supreme 
subjective  end  of  conduct  seems  at  first  sight  an 
acknowledgment  that  all  conduct  must  be  good, 
since  all  conduct,  consciously  or  unconsciously, 
is  directed  towards  that  end.  But  the  pleasure- 
lover  is  so  far  from  being  by  necessity  a  moral 
person  that  he  merits  much  too  often  the  severe 
criticism  of  the  more  ascetic.  We  have  here  a 
situation  which  demands  adequate  explanation, 
and  which  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to 
morality  to  explain,  —  on  the  one  side,  persons 
pursuing  with  might  and  main  the  admitted  goal 
of  moral  conduct,  happiness,  and  on  the  other 
side,  the  entirely  just  criticism  that  their  conduct 
is  not  only  not  moral,  but  too  frequently  is 
highly  immoral.  I  emphasize  the  riddle  because 
I  believe  it  to  be  at  bottom  the  obstacle  which 
prevents  many  persons  from  accepting  a  rational 
system  of  morals ;  the  obstacle  which  prevents 
obedience  to  a  splendid  old  text :  Serve  the 
Lord  with  gladness  ;  the  obstacle  which  forces 
many  a  severe  moralist  to  regard  that  quest  of 
good  fortune,  to  which  I  and  my  little  book  are 
pledged,  as  an  adventure  of  more  than  doubtful 

97 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

worth.  Moreover,  many  o£  us  know  by  personal 
experience  the  puritan  tendency  in  such  matters. 
Taken  unawares  and  before  we  have  had  time 
to  think  the  problem  out,  we  instinctively  jump 
to  the  conclusion  that  of  two  alternatives,  the 
more  disagreeable  must  be  the  right  one.  So 
much  of  life  is  instinctive  and  habitual  that  such 
a  tendency  in  the  blood  makes  for  unnecessary 
harshness  and  ungraciousness,  and  does  it  in 
the  sincere  pursuit  of  a  high  moraHty. 

Furthermore,  this  same  riddle  is  at  the  bottom 
of  that  old  and  pretty  well  thrashed-out  quarrel 
between  egoism  and  altruism.  It  is  commonly 
felt  that  when  people  do  what  they  want  to  do, 
they  generally  do  what  is  bad  for  themselves,  and 
always  what  is  bad  for  other  people.  And  the 
riddle  is  also  responsible  for  that  wide  breach 
to  which  reference  has  already  been  made  in  the 
Prologue,  the  breach  between  those  moralists 
who  hold  that  happiness  is  the  highest  good,  the 
sum/mum  honum,  and  those  other  moralists  who 
hold  that  the  highest  good  lies  in  conformity  to 
an  outer  objective  standard. 

Difficult  as  the  riddle  is,  and  important  as  the 
chain  of  consequences  is,  the  solution  is  not  so 
very  far  to  seek. 

First  of  all,  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  moral- 
ity is  the  product  of  two  factors,  —  efficiency  and 
worth,  —  and  this  is  one  half  the  solution.    Con- 

98 


WORTH 


duct  which  proposes  for  its  end  a  form  of  the 
purest  happiness,  but  fails  to  attain  it,  is  im- 
moral. Less  severely  stated,  such  conduct  is  moral 
only  to  the  extent  that  it  attains  its  end,  that  is, 
to  the  extent  that  it  is  efficient.  The  pleasure- 
lover,  even  though  he  pursue  the  most  exalted 
pleasure,  is  not  a  moral  person  unless  he  make 
his  pursuit  causational  and  effective.  No  sub- 
limity in  the  pleasure  sought  will  give  content 
to  morality  unless  the  other  factor,  efficiency,  is 
also  sizable. 

In  the  second  place,  and  more  important  still, 
the  happiness  upon  which  uninformed  desire  sets 
its  heart  is  found  very  commonly  to  be  a  bitter- 
sweet sort  of  happiness,  to  be  a  happiness  of 
such  false  measure  as  to  be  succeeded  by  more 
than  proportionate  pain,  —  and  this  is  the  other 
half  of  the  solution.  Moral  criticism  may  justly 
be  directed,  not  against  the  pursuit  of  happiness, 
but  against  the  pursuit  of  an  inverted  happiness. 
In  reality,  the  criticism  is  directed  against  the 
ignorance  and  narrowness,  the  sensuality  and 
selfishness,  which  obscure  a  man's  vision  and  pre- 
vent him  from  seeing  in  what  genuine  happiness 
consists.  If  pyrite  be  substituted  for  gold,  one 
can  have  no  quarrel  with  the  genuine  metal 
because  the  fool's  gold  failed  to  stand  the  test. 
When  we  pronounce  judgment  against  an  article, 
we  are  bound  in  the  interest  of  common  honesty 

99 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

to  see  that  we  have  hold  of  the  article  itself  and 
are  not  dealing  with  a  counterfeit.  The  reviewer 
who  read  one  book,  and  attached  the  scathing 
criticism  it  called  forth  to  a  totally  different 
book,  would  be  esteemed  a  most  outrageous  per- 
son. What  shall  we  say  of  the  moralist  who 
does  practically  just  that  thing  in  the  realm  of 
conduct,  who  finds  seK-indulgence  and  folly  and 
selfishness  unprofitable  to  the  last  degree,  —  as 
all  must  find  them  in  the  end,  —  and  proceeds 
forthwith  to  condemn  in  quite  unmeasured  terms 
a  totally  different  thing,  the  pursuit  of  a  sound 
and  genuine  happiness  ?  He  seems  in  the  same 
case  with  those  disputants  who  set  up  men  of 
straw  and  find  pleasure  in  the  light  gymnastic  of 
knocking  them  over.  It  is  true  that  these  mis- 
taken judgments  are  made  easy  and  somewhat 
natural  by  the  fact  that  the  paths  of  self-indul- 
gence and  folly  and  selfishness  are  commonly 
chosen  under  a  belief  that  they  lead  to  happiness, 
in  fact  are  by  a  psychological  necessity  chosen 
under  such  a  belief,  but  the  judgments  are  not 
on  this  account  made  righteous.  The  justifiable 
conclusion  from  the  large  data  of  wrong-doing 
is  that  the  individual  grasp  after  happiness  is  not 
necessarily  or  even  commonly  moral.  And  a  fur- 
ther conclusion  is  that  the  individual  ideal  of 
happiness  needs  correction.  But  this  is  what  the 
empirical  moralist  has  been  saying  all  along.    It 

100 


WORTH 


is  ignorance  that  constitutes  the  great  mainspring 
of  immoral  conduct.  It  is  ignorance  that  is  the 
fundamental  immorality  in  the  universe.  One 
who  knows  all  understands  all,  forgives  all.  If 
we  were  infinitely  wise,  we  should  be  infinitely 
good.  There  may  be  limited  devils.  There  could 
not  be  a  malevolent  deity. 

This  brings  us  quite  naturally  and  inevitably 
to  that  objective  side  of  worth  which  we  have 
called  social  welfare.  The  practical  inquiry  as  to 
how  a  man  in  pursuit  of  personal  happiness  can 
learn  quite  assuredly  that  he  is  not  following  a 
will-o'-the-wisp, 'not  turned  towards  a  mirage,  but 
has  started  upon  a  veritable  moral  quest,  becomes 
in  effect  an  inquiry  into  how  far  his  idea  of  good 
fortune  will  bear  comparison  with  that  objective 
standard  of  worth  which  has  emerged  from  the 
longer  view  and  deeper  experience  of  the  race. 
There  need  be  no  confusion  of  moral  values  if 
it  be  always  borne  in  mind  that  worth  has  this 
double  aspect,  and  essentially  fails  to  be  worth 
unless  both  the  objective  and  subjective  standards 
are  genuinely  satisfied. 

Such  a  chastening  of  individual  desire  by  con- 
stant reference  to  objective  welfare  is  the  time- 
honored  process  of  discipline.  It  is  simply  a 
process  of  correcting  the  experience  of  one  man 
by  the  experience  of  many  men.  The  discipline 
falls  upon  all.   In  the  case  of  the  unreflective, 

101 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

it  is  forced  from  without.  In  the  case  of  the 
thoughtful  man,  it  is  self-imposed.  But  disci- 
pline is  more  essential  to  the  seeker  after  good  for- 
tune, where  good  fortune  means  happiness,  than 
it  is  to  the  ascetic.  For  in  a  large  way  there  is  only 
one  path  to  happiness,  the  path  of  the  genuinely 
moral  life ;  while  there  are  many  paths  to  misery, 
to  the  denial  of  happiness,  to  immorality.  The 
one  is  quite  literally  the  straight  and  narrow  path; 
the  other,  quite  literally,  the  broad  and  accommo- 
dating road. 

Morality  grows  quite  inevitably  out  of  expe- 
rience, for  all  life  is  discipline*.  Personal  im- 
pulse and  degire  are  forever  being  instructed  by 
the  pressure  of  events.  A  man  is  taught  by  life, 
whether  he  will  or  not,  whether  he  knows  it  or 
not,  for  evolution  and  genuine  education  are 
much  the  same  operation.  Day  by  day,  and  all 
unconsciously,  there  come  about  the  strength- 
ening of  those  desires  and  the  impressing  of 
those  habits  which  make  for  human  welfare.  The 
apparent  aim  of  evolution,  as  of  education,  is  to 
make  a  human  world  more  human.  Morality  is 
distinctly  the  child  of  wisdom.  In  turning  from 
individual  desire  to  the  test  of  social  welfare,  we 
turn  indeed  from  limited  personal  knowledge  to 
the  larger  racial  wisdom. 

But  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  in  the  well- 
born at  least,  the  larger  and  more  abiding  part 

102 


WORTH 


of  this  racial  wisdom  is  not  outer  and  objective, 
but  is  an  inner  possession  stored  up  in  one's  own 
heart,  the  precious  heritage  of  the  ages.  This 
ever-present  instinct  tends  to  inhibit  all  lower 
desires  and  strengthen  all  social  impulses.  When 
the  prophet  comes,  the  divine  teacher,  he  is  the 
focus  of  this  larger  wisdom,  and  commonly  he 
offends  society,  except  the  chosen  few,  by  his  de- 
parture from  the  average  ideal  of  social  welfare. 
Only  the  few  perceive  that  he  stands  above  the 
accepted  level,  instead  of  below  it.  The  majority 
of  the  well-born  have  their  moments  of  greater 
insight,  when  they  are  tfempted  to  transcend  the 
standards  of  their  environment.  If  the  impulse 
be  a  true  advance,  the  immediate  result  may  be 
suffering,  the  pain  of  progress,  but  the  ultimate 
result  is  a  supreme  happiness.  It  is  salutary, 
however,  when  one  projects  or  estimates  such  a 
contravention  of  accepted  standards,  to  inquire 
with  the  utmost  diligence  whether  the  new  level 
is  above  or  below  the  old  one.  It  is  a  prudent 
and  commonplace  course  to  stick  pretty  close  to 
the  average  ideal  of  social  welfare.  The  criminals 
of  society  fall  below  it ;  the  saints  and  martyrs 
rise  above  it.  Much  that  we  do  every  day,  and 
without  the  least  compunction,  is  in  reality  quite 
vicious,  but  it  will  be  properly  classed  only  when 
the  tide  of  moral  perception  rises  above  it.  But 
as  soon  as  one  recognizes  this  fact,  one  realizes 

103 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

that  it  is  no  longer  moral  to  limit  one's  concep- 
tion of  worth  in  conduct  to  the  prudent  and 
commonplace  level  of  the  average  conception. 
One  is  bound,  by  the  very  insight,  to  a  moral 
alertness  in  criticising  all  ideals  of  worth,  whether 
the  ideals  of  good  fortune  or  of  social  welfare. 

There  is  such  a  thing  as  strictly  personal  wel- 
fare, which  we  may  call  individual  morality,  but 
even  this  solitary  wisdom  depends  for  its  extent 
and  soundness  upon  the  race  experience.  To 
these  private  problems  of  morality  the  individ- 
ual simply  applies  the  accumulated  wisdom  of 
the  age,  and  if  he  fail  tt)  do  this,  he  fails  com- 
monly to  solve  the  problems.  But  practical 
morality  does  not  long  concern  itself  with  the 
conduct  of  the  solitary,  for  life  does  not  supply 
this  spectacle.  Conduct  in  all  its  large  phases  is 
the  purposeful  activity  of  a  group  of  men,  and 
the  human  relations  which  find  place  in  such  a 
group  constitute  the  major  content  of  the  indi- 
vidual life.  A  man  has  certain  very  sacred  rela- 
tions with  himself  which  it  is  of  the  utmost 
importance  to  have  sound  and  true,  but  the 
relations  with  his  fellows  form  the  bulk  of  his 
conduct  and  of  his  life.  In  idealizing  these  re- 
lations, he  finds  the  greater  play  for  his  moral 
activity.  These  idealizations  concern  society,  it 
is  true,  and  in  their  total,  make  up  that  social 
welfare  which  represents  the  objective  side  of 

104 


WORTH 


moral  worth;  but  limiting  the  scrutiny  for  the 
moment  to  one  man,  the  idealizations  are  of  far 
graver  importance  to  him  than  to  society.  They 
determine  his  personal  success  or  failure,  while 
socially  speaking,  they  are  but  a  drop  in  the 
ocean  of  welfare.  It  is  commendable  enough  to 
urge  social-mindedness  upon  a  man  from  the 
community  point  of  view,  but  it  is  quite  untrue 
to  the  fact  to  represent  it  as  a  social  claim  and 
an  individual  concession.  It  is  nothing  of  the 
sort.  It  is  a  joint  opportunity,  but  one  in  which 
the  individual  gets  vastly  more  than  he  gives. 
He  gets  the  very  condition  necessary  for  increas- 
ing his  stature  as  a  man.  He  might  well  shrink 
back  from  a  just  sense  of  over-requital,  but 
never  from  any  justifiable  idea  of  self-sacrifice. 
The  community  can  well  enough  do  without  me, 
but  I  cannot  do  without  the  community. 

Morality  has  mainly  to  do  with  this  interplay 
between  a  man  and  his  fellows,  and  not  alone 
because  the  problems  are  manifold,  but  because 
they  constitute  the  very  life  of  the  man  himself. 
To  make  this  interplay  ideal  is  a  man's  first  con- 
cern. It  is  an  utterly  false  view  to  erect  such  an 
interplay  into  an  essential  antagonism.  Between 
an  ignorant  man  and  an  ignorant  community 
there  is  often  very  real  warfare.  But  the  quarrel 
is  not  due  to  any  genuine  antagonism  of  interest, 
but  wholly  to    the  blindness   of  all  ignorance. 

105 


THE    CHILDREN   OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

Between  egoism,  the  good  fortune  of  the  individ- 
ual, and  altruism,  the  welfare  of  society,  there  is 
no  gulf  fixed.  Success  does  not  consist,  as  so 
often  represented,  in  an  amiable  compromise  be- 
tween the  two,  a  noonday  siesta  of  lion  and  lamb, 
but  in  a  very  genuine  extension  of  both.  The 
better  the  fortune  of  the  individual,  the  larger 
the  welfare  of  society ;  the  more  thorough-going 
the  welfare  of  society,  the  more  complete  the 
good  fortune  of  the  individual. 

This  essential  identity  of  interest  is  a  modern 
conception.  It  is  the  result,  however,  of  a  tre- 
mendous social  experience,  —  the  experience  of 
excessive  state-power  in  Europe,  the  experience 
of  excessive  individualism  in  America.  The  trend 
of  social  evolution  has  been  from  the  human 
mass,  the  clan  or  family,  to  the  human  unit,  the 
individual.  The  process  is,  of  course,  incomplete, 
and  finds  fruition  only  in  a  few  highly  evolved 
minds  and  a  few  advanced  communities. 

The  conception  of  an  identity  of  interest  be- 
tween the  individual  and  society  is  of  high  impor- 
tance in  morality.  It  removes  the  last  possible 
vestige  of  antagonism  between  the  subjective  and 
the  objective  aspects  of  worth.  The  chastening 
of  individual  desire  imposed  by  society  does  not 
imply  either  theoretically  or  practically  the  cur- 
tailment of  good  fortune,  but  rather  its  utmost 
realization  and  extension.    The  individual  desire, 

106 


WORTH 


by  this  objective  criticism,  is  rectified  and  en- 
lightened. The  heart's  desire  is  not  defeated, 
but  transformed,  turned  towards  those  activities 
which  lead  to  a  good  fortune  that  will  bear 
investigation,  to  the  attainment  of  genuine  hap- 
piness. 

The  whole  function  of  the  welfare  criticism 
in  estimating  the  worth  of  conduct  is  to  keep 
happiness-seeking  conduct  sound  and  true  ;  and 
to  see  to  it  that  the  pleasure-lover  is  a  moral 
person,  not  by  ceasing  to  love  pleasure,  but 
by  learning  to  love  true  pleasure  instead  of  its 
counterfeits. 

This  conception  of  worth,  which  unites  good 
fortune  and  social  welfare  into  one  quest,  dis- 
poses once  for  all  of  that  curious  biological  view 
which  has  recently  been  much  in  vogue,  the  view 
which  makes  society  an  organism  endowed  with 
a  life  quite  different  in  kind  from  the  life. of  its 
individual  components,  and  capable  of  a  mys- 
terious perfection  not  only  superior  to  anything 
so  puny  as  individual  excellence,  but  purchased 
sometimes  at  the  cost  of  it. 

But  more  important  far  than  any  mere  over- 
turning of  fantastic  analogies  is  the  serviceable 
effect  of  such  a  conception  of  identity  in  mak- 
ing both  the  subjective  and  objective  worth  of 
conduct  consist  in  its  happiness-producing  power. 
It  is  a  conception  which  stamps  the  social  pur- 

107 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

pose  as  essentially  immoral  if  it  do  not  make  for 
human  wealth  and  happiness,  for  the  unequivo- 
cal attainment  of  personal  good  fortune.  It 
condemns  quite  unsparingly  those  subterfuges 
and  sophistries  by  which  both  individuals  and 
nations  erect  industrial  and  material  achieve- 
ment into  success,  regardless  of  the  condition 
of  the  men  and  women  who  lend  a  hand.  Just 
as  it  can  be  shown  that  the  uninstructed  pursuit 
of  pleasure  leads  to  grave  moral  disorders,  —  to 
self-indulgence  and  folly  and  selfishness,  —  so 
it  can  be  shown,  and  quite  as  abundantly,  that 
the  uninstructed  pursuit  of  social  welfare  leads 
to  equally  grave  disorders,  —  to  oppression  and 
misery  and  death.  The  quest  of  good  fortune,  in 
the  hands  of  those  who  do  not  know  in  what  good 
fortune  consists,  may  lead  to  licentiousness.  The 
quest  of  social  welfare,  in  the  hands  of  those  who 
do  not  know  in  what  social  welfare  consists,  may 
lead  to  brutality.  The  corrective  is  similar  in 
both  cases.  As  we  have  abundantly  seen,  good 
fortune  had  to  submit  to  the  objective  standard 
of  welfare,  else  it  ran  great  risk  of  losing  worth 
and  so  ceasing  to  be  good  fortune.  It  is  quite  as 
imperative  that  the  idea  of  welfare  be  chastened 
by  constant  reference  to  the  subjective  stand- 
ard of  good  fortune,  else  it,  too,  loses  worth  and 
ceases  to  be  welfare. 

The  application  of  this  doctrine  to  social  ques- 

108 


WORTH 


tions  has  distinctly  radical  consequences,  as  we 
shall  see  further  on,  but  we  cannot  escape  the 
consequences  without  repudiating  the  doctrine. 
Personal  wrong-doing  is  so  immediate  in  its  re- 
sults that  we  are  always  ready  to  apply  the 
strait-jacket  of  welfare.  But  social  wrong-doing 
commonly  masquerades  under  the  name  of  wel- 
fare, and  though  the  results  are  manifestly  harm- 
ful, we  are  prone  to  take  a  pessimistic  view  and 
count  them  inevitable.  What  is  wanted  is  a  sim- 
ilar strait-jacket,  the  test  of  good  fortune  applied 
to  the  reputed  welfare. 

We  may  sum  up  this  too  long  chapter  by  saying 
that  worth  in  conduct  includes  at  the  same  mo- 
ment individual  good  fortune  and  social  welfare  ; 
and  that  as  an  end,  it  means  a  human  happiness 
whose  length  and  breadth  and  height  are  con- 
stantly increasing.  Conduct  which  produces  such 
a  happiness  as  its  result  possesses  efficiency  and 
worth,  and  is  moral. 


VII 

THE  MORAL  PERSON 

MORALITY,  as  a  science,  is  unemotional. 
It  seeks  to  discern  what  conduct  is  right, 
and  what  conduct  is  wrong,  and  why.  It  declares 
human  conduct  to  be  coextensive  with  human 
activity,  because  all  activity  is  essentially  purpose- 
ful. It  bisects  into  efficiency  and  worth,  judging 
conduct  as  to  whether  it  accomplishes  its  purpose, 
and  as  to  whether  the  purpose  represents  personal 
good  fortune  and  social  welfare.  Human  conduct 
is  the  adjustment  of  means  to  ends,  and  is  good 
or  right  just  in  proportion  to  its  efficiency  and 
the  happiness-producing  power  of  the  ends.  This 
is  morality  in  its  most  general  terms.  It  is  a  stand- 
ard, a  measuring-rod,  and  pronounces  no  judg- 
ment upon  conduct,  or  upon  persons. 

But  the  interest  and  value  in  such  an  abstract 
morality  rest  in  its  appHcation  to  the  very  concrete 
problems  of  daily  life.  To  make  this  personal 
application  is  to  import  into  morality  the  banished 
warmth  of  the  human  element,  to  bring  back 
again  the  terms  of  human  stress  and  strain,  those 
words  which  are  the  nucleus  of  our  deepest  feel- 
ings, the  words  '  duty,'  ^obligation,' '  opportunity,' 

110 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


'  responsibility,'  the  most  potent  of  all  action 
words,  —  ought.  To  do  this  is  to  pass  from  the 
science  of  right  conduct  to  the  art.  It  is  to  touch 
morality  with  emotion.  This  art  of  right  conduct, 
this  morality  in  action,  may  properly  be  called 
Religion,  for  religion  is  a  man's  attitude  toward 
life,  toward  the  seen  and  the  unseen,  and  this 
attitude  can  be  expressed  only  through  conduct. 
The  Twentieth  Century  opens  as  an  eminently 
religious  age.  It  is  a  time  when  the  moral  law 
has  laid  firm  hold  upon  the  human  heart,  and 
with  incomparable  urgency  is  pressing  it  to  action. 
To  say  this  is  not  to  deny  that  it  is  a  time  of 
gigantic  wrong-doing,  but  the  wrong-doing  is 
being  called  in  question  and  measured  by  high 
standards.  This  major  concern  of  society  is  in- 
creasingly getting  itself  expressed  in  the  daily 
affairs  of  life,  not  on  one  day  alone,  and  through 
one  institution  alone,  but  on  aU  days  and  through 
all  institutions,  in  the  family,  in  education,  in  art, 
in  science,  in  all  forms  of  social  activity.  This 
social  progress  in  morality  is  not,  however,  a 
social  phenomenon  apart  from  the  individual.  It  is 
merely  a  summation  of  individual  gains,  and  rests 
upon  the  evolution  of  its  individual  component, 
the  moral  person.  While,  therefore,  the  quest  of 
good  fortune  is  the  personal  moral  aim  of  each 
one  of  us,  it  is  necessarily  the  very  heart  of  the 
social  purpose. 

Ill 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

To  apply  morality  in  the  concerns  of  the  in- 
dividual life  is  to  adopt  religion.  It  is  to  become 
the  highest  type  of  man,  the  philosopher-artist, 
for  the  philosopher  is  the  man  of  clear  vision,  the 
believer  in  cause  and  effect,  the  one  who  sees  in 
what  happiness  essentially  consists ;  and  the  artist 
is  the  doer,  the  man  who  carries  cause  and  effect 
into  beneficent  action,  and  practically  realizes 
happiness.  The  philosopher  represents  worth  of 
ends  and  the  artist  efficiency  of  means.  The 
moral  person  must  be  a  combination  of  the  two, 
the  man  who  knows  and  the  man  who  does.  The 
quest  of  the  philosopher-artist  is  in  reality  the 
quest  of  culture,  the  practical  study  and  pursuit 
of  moral  perfection,  a  quest  which  is  at  once  the 
supreme  duty  and  the  supreme  pleasure  of  human 
life.  All  that  makes  against  this  serious  culture 
of  our  human  nature,  against  our  power  both  to 
discern  and  to  realize  happiness  for  ourselves  and 
for  others,  must  be  looked  upon  as  a  denial  of 
morality,  and  this  whether  the  obstruction  come 
in  the  name  of  economic  requirement,  or  social 
expediency,  or  education,  or  dogmatism.  The 
practice  of  morality  requires  the  development  of 
personal  power,  the  heightening  of  intellectual 
and  artistic  interest,  the  broadening  of  human 
affection  and  sympathy,  the  deepening  of  spirit- 
ual insight. 

The  moral  person  is  the  one  who  manifests  in 

112 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


his  own  life  the  two  requirements  of  morality, 
efficiency  and  worth.  He  must  find  out  by  care- 
ful study,  by  personal  experience,  by  deliberate 
experimenting,  just  how  he  can  best  increase  his 
own  individual  efficiency,  and  then  he  must  do 
it.  And  he  must  find  out,  by  the  same  tireless 
endeavor,  what  ends  of  conduct  are  most  worth 
pursuing.  He  must  be  competent  and  he  must 
be  wise.  If  he  be  neither  of  these,  or  only  one  of 
them,  he  is  not  moral,  no  matter  what  his  call- 
ing or  pretensions,  no  matter  what  he  thinks  of 
himseK  or  others  think  of  him,  no  matter  what 
his  family  or  possessions.  The  man  who  demands 
success  of  himself  demands  a  great  deal,  but  if 
he  ask  less,  he  is  not  in  earnest  in  his  search  for 
the  moral  life.  Those  who  are  interested  in  prac- 
tical morality  are  interested  to  inquire  what  type 
of  man  and  what  sort  of  career  are  best  calculated 
to  develop  efficiency  and  to  manifest  worth. 

A  machine  is  said  to  be  efficient  when  it  per- 
forms a  large  amount  of  useful  work  in  pro- 
portion to  the  amount  of  horse-power  put  into 
it.  Such  a  machine  must  be  well  designed,  and 
this  can  be  only  when  there  is  an  adequate  know- 
ledge of  the  power  available,  of  the  material  to 
be  used,  and  of  the  work  to  be  done.  It  must  be 
well  built,  a  matter  of  careful  workmanship  and 
of  good  material.  It  must  be  kept  in  order.  It 
must  be  supplied  with  power.  An  efficient  person 

113 


THE    CHILDREN    OF   GOOD    FORTUNE 

must  satisfy  quite  the  same  requisites  as  the  effi- 
cient machine,  must  do  it  with  equal  accuracy  and 
still  greater  subtlety.  Efficiency  in  human  con- 
duct means  control  of  the  motive-power,  a  know- 
ledge of  its  source  and  function ;  sound  health  of 
body  and  mind  ;  and  well-trained  organs  of  sense. 
Besides  this  very  obvious  equipment  in  power  and 
material,  efficiency  means  a  clear  realization  of 
the  work  to  be  done,  that  is,  a  clear  realization 
of  the  ends  which  are  to  be  gained.  The  efficient 
person,  like  the  efficient  machine,  must  not  only 
be  well  designed  for  the  work  in  hand,  but  he 
must  be  well  built,  built  of  sound  flesh  and  bone 
and  blood,  built  of  causational  habits  of  thought 
and  action.  He  must  keep  himself  in  good  work- 
ing order,  and  he  must  see  to  it  that  the  motive- 
power  of  high  achievement  is  never  lacking. 

These  requisites  of  human  efficiency  represent 
a  distinct  chapter  in  personal  morality.  They 
constitute  the  business  that  a  man  has  with  him- 
self, a  sort  of  closet  morality,  a  private  reckon- 
ing. Efficiency  in  conduct  is  character  in  per- 
sons. It  is  the  more  individual  haH  of  morality, 
the  sort  of  achievement  that  a  man  must  carry 
out  alone.  But  it  has  its  public,  social  side.  The 
man  who  seeks  efficiency  must  needs  know  what 
other  men  have  done  to  gain  it.  He  must  broaden 
his  own  limited  personal  experience  by  reference 
to  the  larger  experience  of  the  race,  just  as  he 

114 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


must  chasten  his  own  private  idea  of  good  for- 
tune by  comparison  with  the  social  idea  of  wel- 
fare. Furthermore,  it  is  human  intercourse  that 
offers  the  larger  field  for  the  exercise  of  efficiency, 
that  produces  it,  tests  it,  expresses  it.  As  Goethe 
puts  it,  talent  is  formed  in  solitude,  but  charac- 
ter in  society.  The  amount  of  efficiency  open  to 
a  recluse  is  limited  both  by  his  smaller  knowledge 
of  the  nature  of  efficiency  and,  still  more,  by  the 
far  smaller  theatre  that  he  has  for  its  develop- 
ment. 

The  efficient  person  requires  wise  plans,  a  know- 
ledge of  the  ends  of  conduct,  sound  equipment 
in  the  way  of  bodily  and  spiritual  power,  perfect 
working  health,  and  above  all,  the  motive-power 
of  strong  conviction  and  interest  and  desire.  In 
a  broad  way  this  constitutes  Individual  Morality. 

Efficiency  involves  a  knowledge  of  the  ends  of 
conduct.  A  man  may,  however,  be  efficient  with- 
out being  worthy,  may  have  character  without 
goodness.  The  great  villains  of  history,  like  the 
great  saints,  have  been  men  of  character.  They 
had  clever  plans,  they  knew  very  definitely  what 
they  wanted,  they  possessed  personal  prowess, 
they  had  the  motive  power  of  a  fierce  desire.  In 
moments  of  strong  reaction  against  sentimentality 
and  other  forms  of  inefficiency,  we  are  all  prone 
to  the  worship  of  force,  and  are  hot  for  the 
apotheosis  of  the  strong  character,  whether  it 

115 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

went  with  the  heart  of  a  villain  or  a  saint.  Mo- 
rahty  joins  forces  with  us  in  our  wholesome  aver- 
sion to  weakness,  in  our  primitive  love  of  per- 
sonal prowess.  But  morality  always  insists  upon 
the  satisfaction  of  its  second  dimension,  worth. 
The  moral  person  must  not  only  be  an  efficient 
machine,  he  must  do  work  that  possesses  the 
highest  degree  of  worth.  As  we  have  seen,  this 
worth  must  satisfy  himself  as  personal  good  for- 
tune, and  must  satisfy  the  community  as  social 
welfare. 

But  the  question  of  worth  is  always  an  open 
question.  We  may  define  worth  as  happiness- 
producing  power,  and  may  count  the  definition 
as  final.  But  the  moral  person  must  go  far  be- 
yond this  generalization.  He  must  find  out  what 
happiness  means,  and  indeed  he  must  go  on 
finding  it  out.  There  is  no  fixed  goal.  The  only 
way  to  discern  happiness  in  its  highest  and  pro- 
gressive form  is  the  method  of  personal  participa- 
tion. The  moral  person  must  be  an  experienced 
person,  not  one  of  narrow  life  and  routine  duties, 
one  in  whom  sensation  and  insight  are  well-nigh 
extinguished.  He  must  not  only  accept  experi- 
ence as  it  comes  his  way,  he  must  deliberately 
seek  it,  must  be  an  experimentalist,  a  veritable 
knight  of  good  fortune. 

It  is  a  curiously  inverted  view  of  morals,  the 
view  which  regards  as  praiseworthy  those  narrow, 

116 


THE   MORAL   PERSON       V  ^^     ,,^  > 


('V"  Of  Tht. 


inexperienced,  poverty-stricken  souls  whose  slen- 
der virtue  consists  in  the  evil  they  have  omitted 
to  do.  To  renounce  the  world,  to  renounce  life, 
to  renounce  the  self, — this  is  not  the  path  of 
the  moral  life.  The  timid  little  souls  who  live  in 
a  corner  and  keep  out  of  harm's  way  by  keeping 
out  of  the  way  of  good,  are  not  moral  persons. 
They  are  not  even  harmless,  for  by  their  coward- 
ice they  inspire  others  with  a  similar  lack  of 
courage. 

There  are  many  of  these  immoral  persons,  and 
they  swarm  in  all  walks  of  life.  For  the  most 
part  they  are  eminently  respectable,  and  they  all 
pride  themselves  on  their  morality,  some  of  them 
on  the  treasure  laid  up  elsewhere.  They  are 
modest  shopkeepers,  small  farmers,  routine  teach- 
ers, apathetic  clergymen,  hand-to-mouth  clerks, 
unambitious  artisans,  and  all  the  other  ^resigned' 
failures  who  leave  unessayed  the  high  adven- 
tures of  life  and  morality.  Let  no  man  deceive 
himself  into  believing  that  he  can  be  so  poor  a 
fragment  of  a  man  and  count  in  the  world  of 
true  values  as  a  moral  person.  He  cannot  pos- 
sibly be  so  ranked.  In  reality,  he  is  a  wretched 
creature,  devoid  of  morality,  because  he  and  his 
works  are  devoid  of  worth.  Resignation,  renun- 
ciation, self-sacrifice,  asceticism,  monasticism,  all 
the  cheap  devices  by  which  men  and  women 
abdicate  life,  are  as  unsound  morally  as  the  more 

117 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

amusing  devices  by  which  men  and  women  abuse 
life. 

These  hundreds  of  thousands  of  commonplace, 
immoral  people,  who  lose  the  best  of  life  by  accept- 
ing the  least  that  is  even  tolerable,  are  found 
on  every  countryside,  gathered  into  every  village, 
crowded  into  the  tenements  of  every  city.  They 
are  the  prisoners  of  a  narrow  environment  which 
they,  and  many  who  genuinely  sympathize  with 
them,  regard  as  inevitable.  To  judge  them 
harshly  is  counted  uncharitable  and  inhuman. 
But  the  true  physician  does  not  hesitate  to  ad- 
minister bitter  medicine  ;  the  skillful  surgeon  does 
not  hesitate  to  use  the  knife.  Neither  must  the 
honest  moralist  decline  to  call  things  by  their 
right  names.  The  persons  who  fail  to  discern  and 
to  reaUze  happiness  are  immoral  persons.  They 
are  veritable  prisoners  of  poverty,  of  disease,  of 
temperament,  of  circumstance.  They  are  objects 
of  the  utmost  pity,  but  the  best  pity  is  the 
practical  pity  which  sets  about  their  liberation. 
They  are  prisoners  of  their  own  ideas,  of  their 
own  ignorance.  No  man  is  wholly  free,  but  when 
he  comes  to  recognize  that  the  jailer  is  within, 
he  knows  at  least  on  what  ground  the  struggle 
for  freedom  is  to  be  fought  out. 

A  man  puts  up  with  much  unhappiness  if 
he  regard  it  as  inevitable,  and  even  brings  some 
grace  of  humor  to  the  ordeal,  which  goes  far  to 

118 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


draw  the  sting.  That  there  is  at  this  moment 
vast  unhappiness  in  the  world  quite  goes  with- 
out saying.  But  no  one  has  ever  been  able  to 
prove  that  it  is  inevitable.  That  done  and  pes- 
simism would  have  gained  its  case.  It  is  true 
that  there  is  a  common  impression  abroad  that 
there  are  not  enough  cakes  and  ale  to  go  all 
round,  and  that  this  constitutes  the  essential  and 
unescapable  misfortune.  If  there  be  not  enough 
good  things  for  everybody,  then  naturally  some- 
body must  go  without. 

Those  who  hold  this  view  quite  properly  preach 
resignation,  and  even  practice  it ;  for  fate  is  not 
to  be  gainsaid,  and  the  one  possible  worth  is  resig- 
nation and  a  graceful  acceptance  of  the  inevitable. 
But  such  a  view  is  tenable  only  if  one  hold  that 
good  fortune  is  a  limited  store,  something  to  be 
scrambled  for,  and  that  it  goes  for  the  most  part 
to  those  who  first  get  their  feet  into  the  trough. 
This  was  evidently  in  Carlyle's  thought  when 
he  declared  the  pursuit  of  happiness  to  be  a  ^  pig 
philosophy.'  If  this  were  the  true  view,  one 
might  well  be  ashamed  of  happiness,  and  more 
willing  to  forego  it  than  to  accept  its  implications. 
'  Far  be  it  from  me  to  be  happy,  dear  friend, 
if  this  mean  that  you  must  be  miserable,  for  I 
have  no  mind  to  play  the  part  of  robber,'  — 
this,  or  something  like  it,  would  be  what  all  the 
self-respecting  amongst  us  would  needs  say,  or 

119 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

affect  to  say.  And  if,  in  addition  to  believing 
that  the  store  of  good  fortune  is  too  scant  to  go 
anywhere  near  decently  round,  we  also  believed 
that  Heaven  inclined  very  decidedly  to  those 
who  failed  to  get  their  share,  the  disposition  to 
renounce  happiness  would  be  not  only  generous, 
but  also  prudential.  It  would  be  a  sort  of  endow- 
ment policy,  a  life  insurance,  payable,  it  is  true, 
only  at  death,  but  payable  to  one's  self  and  not 
to  one's  heirs. 

But  experience  does  not  show  that  either  of 
these  contentions  is  true.  Good  fortune  is  per- 
sonal and  subjective.  Happiness  is  a  feeling. 
Welfare  implies  the  possession  of  the  necessaries 
of  life,  but  for  its  major  content  it  depends  upon 
our  attitude  toward  things,  rather  than  upon  the 
things  themselves.  The  keenest  part  of  good 
fortune  is  strictly  personal.  It  consists  in  the 
splendid  exultation  that  goes  with  a  sound, 
healthy  body  and  well-trained  senses.  It  consists 
in  the  curiosity  and  delight  which  circle  like  an 
aureole  about  the  developed  mind.  It  consists 
in  the  generous  love  one  has  for  one's  family  and 
one's  friends,  in  the  sense  of  their  love  and  in- 
terest. It  consists  in  the  vital  life  of  the  spirit, 
the  sense  of  genuine  communion  with  the  higher 
intelligence  of  the  universe,  and  of  participation 
in  the  superb  and  timeless  existence  of  eternity. 

This  is  human  wealth,  the  major  constituent 
120 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


of  all  good  fortune,  and  of  this  human  wealth 
there  is  enough  to  go  all  round.  We  do  not  all 
possess  health  and  beauty  and  accomplishment, 
intellect  and  comradeship  and  spirituality,  but 
the  potential  supply  is  infinite.  We  have  to  work 
for  this  wealth,  but  it  is  not  the  hazard  of  good 
fortune.  It  is  the  certitude.  The  pursuit  of 
human  wealth  is  free  from  any  gambling  ele- 
ment. It  is  possibly  the  absence  of  this  excite- 
ment that  leads  so  few  to  seek  it.  But  it  is  also 
free  from  remorse.  The  man  who  seeks  this  sort 
of  personal  human  wealth  has  not  only  the  great 
joy  of  possession,  but  also  the  great  joy  of  know- 
ing that,  in  place  of  robbing  others  or  even  mak- 
ing good  fortune  more  difficult  for  others,  he  is 
in  reality  helping  the  neighbor  to  attain  good  for- 
tune for  himself.  Human  wealth  is  contagious. 
It  tends  to  beget  a  like  wealth  in  others.  It  is 
the  one  possible  wealth  in  a  true  democracy. 

When  a  beautiful  person  enters  the  room,  — 
and  I  use  the  word  '  beautiful '  in  its  proper  and 
inclusive  sense,  to  mean  the  beautiful  in  body 
and  mind,  heart  and  spirit,  —  the  dullest  of  us 
feels  a  thrill,  a  distinct  uplift,  that"  we  should 
most  unwillingly  have  foregone.  Stevenson  says 
that  it  is  as  if  another  candle  had  been  lighted. 
And  we  all  know  how  communicable  was  his 
good  fortune ;  how  he  shared  it  with  men  and 
women  and  children  in  all  parts  of  the  English- 

121 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

speaking  world,  with  an  alien  and  unlettered 
people  on  a  remote  island  of  the  Pacific,  and  how, 
in  sharing  his  fortune,  it  grew  infinitely  larger. 

This  personal  and  vital  core  of  good  fortune 
is  open  to  every  man,  not  as  a  problematical 
reward  of  striving,  but  something  as  inevitable 
as  gravitation.  The  man  who  gains  this  highest 
good,  who  grows  strong  and  beautiful  and  ac- 
complished, wise  and  warm-hearted  and  reverent, 
is  a  moral  person.  The  man  who  fails  of  this 
good  fortune  is  an  immoral  person. 

Nor  does  that  wretched  underworld  conten- 
tion that  suffering  is  acceptable  to  Heaven  find 
any  support  in  normal,  healthy-minded  experi- 
ence. It  is  a  most  ungentlemanly,  ill-bred  belief, 
a  sort  of  shopkeeping  way  of  looking  at  things, 
a  species  of  interworld  gambling.  You  pay  into 
the  bank  a  certain  amount  of  finite  suffering, 
credited  for  the  most  part  at  much  more  than 
its  face  value,  and  you  get  out  infinite  bliss, 
—  a  quite  shameless  usury.  One's  very  instincts 
revolt  against  it.  And  when  one  turns  to  moral- 
ity, one  learns  that  the  revolt  is  sound  and  just. 
For  moraht'y  says  that  the  wages  of  sin  is  death ; 
not  alone  the  final  death,  but  the  illness  and 
misery  and  suffering  that  lead  up  to  the  climax. 
And  morality  says  that  the  unavoidable  reward 
of  righteousness  is  happiness ;  not  alone  the  final, 
ineffable  happiness,  but  the  health  and  delight 

122 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


and  satisfaction  that  make  up  the  happiness  of 
to-day. 

It  is  true  that  moral  persons  suffer,  but  this  is 
no  occasion  for  inventing  a  theodicy.  The  moral 
man  most  frequently  suffers  not  because  he  is 
moral,  but  because  he  is  partly  moral.  The  suf- 
fering bears  to  his  morality  the  same  relation 
that  the  pain  of  disease  bears  to  health.  The 
pain  is  beneficent  to  the  extent  that  it  tells  us 
something  is  wrong,  and  we  then  proceed  to 
right  it.  But  the  pain  itself  is  not  good.  The 
superb  health,  free  from  every  vestige  of  pain,  is 
infinitely  better.  So  suffering  is  wholly  bene- 
ficent to  the  extent  that  it  is  the  unavoidable 
result  of  wrong-doing.  The  suffering  warns  the 
wrong-doer,  just  as  pain  warns  the  sick  man.  If 
he  neglect  the  warning,  the  results  are  fatal. 
But  right-doing,  which  would  have  escaped  all 
suffering,  would  have  been  infinitely  better.  It 
is  a  sickly,  unmanly  attitude,  this  attitude  of 
begging  to  be  whipped.  If  you  deserve  the  whip- 
ping, you  will  get  it  quite  surely  enough,  for  suf- 
fering goes  with  immorality  as  inseparably  as 
does  happiness  with  morality. 

There  is  a  nobler  form  of  suffering  which 
comes  to  the  moral  man,  not  as  the  schoolmas- 
ter's rod  comes  to  the  truant,  but  in  that  more 
heroic  guise  which  is  commonly  called  self-sacri- 
fice, but  which  ought  in  reality  'to  be  called  self- 

123 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

realization.  It  is  the  suffering  which  a  man  will- 
ingly endures  in  order  to  save  others,  endures 
even  to  the  extent  of  losing  his  own  earth-life. 
From  the  point  of  view  of  the  individual,  this 
heroism  is  not  a  sacrifice,  but  a  realization.  It 
may  have  been  a  bitter  alternative,  this  sudden 
parting  with  the  dear  comrades  of  the  present, 
this  abrupt  cutting  short  of  an  interesting  earth 
career,  but  less  bitter  surely  than  the  life-long 
sense  of  omitted  manliness.  To  the  intelligent 
believer  in  immortality,  death  is  not  the  extreme 
calamity  that  it  is  represented  to  be.  There  are 
many  worse  disasters.  Even  to  the  intelligent 
non-believer,  death  is  inevitable,  and  something 
to  be  met  under  the  least  unfavorable  circum- 
stances. 

But  this  heroism,  which  involved  the  loss  of 
so  devoted  and  so  socially  valuable  an  individual, 
must  also  be  regarded  from  the  point  of  view  of 
the  community.  What  were  the  circumstances 
that  made  the  loss  possible  or  necessary?  In 
some  cases  the  occasion  was  one  of  those  natu- 
ral catastrophes  which  are  humanly  unprevent- 
able,  —  a  tidal  wave,  a  volcanic  eruption,  an 
earthquake,  a  flood,  —  and  the  hero  gave  life  or 
limb  to  save  others  from  disasters  for  which  nei- 
ther they  nor  society  were  to  blame.  But  these 
cases  are  very  rare.  The  natural  disaster  —  the 
shipwreck,    fire,    flood,   landslide  —  could   com- 

124 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


monly  have  been  escaped,  had  there  been  greater 
knowledge  and  forethought.  In  the  great  majority 
of  cases,  the  suffering  of  the  hero  may  be  directly 
traced  to  wrong-doing  on  the  part  of  somebody. 
The  group  as  a  whole  must  be  adjudged  guilty 
of  immorality.  The  group  pays  for  it  by  the  loss 
of  the  very  type  of  person  it  can  least  afford  to 
do  without.  When  a  good  man  dies,  the  disaster 
is  not  his,  —  it  is  a  disaster  to  the  society  which 
loses  his  presence  and  his  service.  And  this  opens 
up  the  large  counter-question  of  how  far  a  moral 
person  may  offer  himself  in  the  place  of  another 
or  of  others. 

Some  years  ago  a  distinguished  London  phy- 
sician gave  his  life  in  order  to  save  the  Hfe 
of  a  poor  little  child  in  one  of  the  hospitals. 
The  child  had  been  poisoned,  and  the  physician, 
knowing  the  tremendous  risk  to  himself,  delib- 
erately sucked  out  the  poison  with  his  own  lips. 
The  child  lived  and  the  physician  died.  One  can 
mention  the  name  of  such  a  man  only  with  the 
utmost  reverence.  It  was  heroism  of  a  sublime 
type.  And  yet  morality,  from  the  community 
point  of  view,  must  condemn  the  act.  It  was 
an  unjustifiable  exchange,  the  giving  of  a  life 
socially  very  valuable  for  a  life  socially  much 
less  valuable.  Had  some  colleague  prevented, 
the  physician  would  doubtless,  by  the  skillful 
ministry  of  years,  have  been  able  to  save  the 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

lives  of  numbers  of  children.  It  is,  of  course, 
quite  possible  that  this  heroic  act  of  self-realiza- 
tion has  inspired  so  much  devotion  on  the  part 
of  those  who  witnessed  it,  or  heard  of  it,  that 
the  total  result  will  be  as  good  socially  as  it  was 
unselfish  individually.  But  this  is  only  a  conjec- 
ture, and  it  seems  to  me  a  safer  social  morality 
to  regard  the  loss  as  well  as  the  gain. 

Less  extreme  illustrations  of  this  conflict  be- 
tween personal  willingness  to  be  heroic  and  the 
demand  of  social  welfare  abound  on  all  sides. 
Here  is  a  little  feeble-minded  child,  whose  par- 
ents, being  people  of  wealth,  can  afford  to  employ 
an  educated,  competent  man  to  act  as  companion 
and  tutor.  They  shrink  very  naturally  from 
sending  the  child  to  an  asylum.  Is  it  right  to 
accept  such  a  post?  My  own  answer  is  most 
decidedly  that  it  would  not  be  right.  The  mere 
fact  that  the  parents  can  afford  to  pay  such  a 
man  for  so  wasting  his  time  does  not  make  the 
waste  justifiable.  The  same  man  would  not  think 
of  taking  a  feeble-minded  child  from  the  gutter, 
even  if  he  had  himself  a  competence,  for  he 
would  have  the  very  wholesome  feeling  that  a 
whole  life,  with  all  its  great  capacity  for  service, 
ought  not  to  be  given  for  something  that  at  best 
can  never  be  more  than  half  a  life.  Socially 
speaking,  the  proper  attendant  for  such  a  child 
would  be  a  kind-hearted  person  of  very  humble 

m 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


attainments,  and  even  then  the  care-taking  ought 
to  be  in  groups  and  not  singly.  The  same  rea- 
soning applies  to  the  case  of  a  brilliant  young 
man  asked  to  take  some  rich  boy  to  Europe  for 
a  year.  It  is  more  than  doubtful  whether  such 
an  act  would  be  moral.  It  is  not  using  capacity 
to  the  utmost.  The  total  social  results  would  be 
better  if  the  time  were  given  to  a  group  of  boys 
in  some  well-organized  school,  or  even  devoted 
to  individual  study. 

These  are  very  special  cases,  but  the  general 
case  remains  forever  true,  that  the  moral  man  is 
not  the  one  who  unreflectively  does  the  nearest 
thing  at  hand  which  happens  to  be  good,  but  the 
one  who  seeks  the  utmost  of  good  fortune,  the 
thing  that  is  most  eminently  worth  while.  We 
have  many  prudential  maxims  about  the  spend- 
ing of  money  and  material,  but  we  have  little 
sound  maxim  and  little  sound  practice  in  the 
matter  of  spending  time.  We  are  all  busy  enough, 
and  diligent  in  business,  the  most  of  us,  but  we 
do  not  sufficiently  see  to  it  that  the  business  is 
quite  worth  while. 

The  greater  part  of  good  fortune  depends 
upon  our  attitude  towards  things,  and  not  upon 
the  thing's  themselves.  Yet  it  would  be  almost  as 
great  a  mistake  to  make  prosperity  independent 
of  material  possessions  as  it  is  to  make  it  con- 
sist in  these  alone.   Houses  and  lands,  furniture 

127 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

and  books,  food  and  clothing,  tools  and  apparatus, 
have  a  genuine  part  to  play  in  the  proper  setting 
of  a  human  life.  The  common  mistake  is  to  re- 
gard them  as  ends  in  themselves.  Their  true  use 
is  as  means.  The  supreme  end  is  human  wealth. 
The  moral  person  must  therefore  regard  pos- 
sessions as  valuable  solely  as  they  minister  to 
human  wealth,  to  the  production  of  a  humanity 
at  once  strong  and  beautiful  and  accomplished 
and  good.  When  things  cease  to  do  this,  they 
are  devoid  of  further  human  use  or  value,  mere 
impedimenta. 

William  Morris  had  an  excellent  rule  in  house- 
hold matters.  It  was  to  have  nothing  in  your 
house  which  you  do  not  either  know  to  be  use- 
ful or  believe  to  be  beautiful.  This  rule  would 
indeed  apply  most  admirably  to  all  our  posses- 
sions. It  is  a  step  in  practical  morality  to  dis- 
pense altogether  with  the  traditional  storeroom, 
to  go  through  one's  home  once,  or  even  twice  a 
year,  getting  rid  of  the  things  not  useful  or 
beautiful,  giving  them  to  some  poorer  neighbor 
if  they  be  not  too  bad  and  would  represent  an 
advance  to  him,  destroying  them  utterly  if  they 
are  really  meretricious.  The  same  purification 
might  well  be  applied  to  one's  library,  one's 
pictures,  one's  wardrobe,  one's  stable,  one's  farm, 
indeed  to  all  one's  possessions,  not  even  omit- 
ting stocks  and  bonds  and  bank  accounts.    To 

128 


THE    MORAL    PERSON 


possess  things,  and  never  to  allow  them  to  possess 
us,  —  this  is  an  essential  part  of  morality. 

When  things  cease  to  minister  to  human 
health  and  happiness,  they  are  so  much  rubbish. 
When  they  obstruct  human  health  and  happiness, 
they  are  worse  than  rubbish,  they  are  tainted  and 
to  be  got  rid  of  to-day,  at  once.  That  things 
have  this  power  to  obstruct  the  moral  life,  we  all 
know,  both  from  a  study  of  our  neighbor's  affairs 
and  from  a  study  of  our  own  affairs,  —  the 
uncomfortable  clothing  which  prevents  a  whole- 
some unconsciousness  of  our  person,  and  keeps 
us  from  commendable  services ;  the  house  which 
requires  too  much  time  for  its  care ;  the  invest- 
ments which  chain  us  to  one  spot  when  human 
opportunity  calls  us  somewhere  else ;  the  too- 
large  salary  which  makes  us  come  to  regard  our 
position  as  more  important  than  ourselves  and 
our  soul's  health.  It  is  a  long  list.  I  am  but 
suggesting  it. 

Good  fortune  requires  that  a  man  shall  domi- 
nate things,  shall  even  destroy  them,  if  they  stand 
too  stubbornly  in  the  way  of  the  moral  life.  We 
may  not  all  be  in  the  plight  of  the  rich  young  man 
whom  Jesus  told  to  sell  all  that  he  had  and  give 
to  the  poor,  for  we  may  not  happen  to  be  setting 
too  great  store  on  our  modest  wealth,  but  if  so, 
and  it  is  not  well  to  be  too  sure  that  we  are  not, 
then  the  thing  to  do  is  to  get  rid  of  it. 

129 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

But  good  fortune  also  requires  that  a  man  shall 
use  things,  and  to  that  extent  it  has  a  distinctly 
material  basis  which  the  moral  person  may  not 
neglect. 

The  most  primitive  need  is  for  food,  and  the 
moral  issue  is  tremendous,  though  commonly 
neglected.  The  food  must  be  of  suitable  quality 
and  in  proper  amount,  the  sort  to  keep  a  man  in 
health  and  spirits,  without  either  starving  him  or 
over-feeding  him.  It  ought  not  only  to  be  unob- 
jectionable, it  ought  to  be  more  than  this,  a 
source  of  positive  pleasure.  It  ought  to  be  par- 
taken under  such  conditions  of  light  and  scene 
and  company  that  each  meal  is  a  veritable  feast 
to  which  one  goes  with  gladness,  and  from  which 
one  comes  away  refreshed  in  mind  and  heart,  as 
well  as  properly  repaired  in  bodily  tissue. 

We  have  all  been  in  places  where  the  food  was 
improper,  a  distinct  moral  failure,  since  it  gave 
neither  strength  nor  pleasure.  And  we  have  all 
been  in  places  where  the  company  and  the  scene 
and  the  light  were  still  more  debilitating.  The 
moral  person  may  not  patiently  accept  these  fail- 
ures. He  is  bound  by  the  very  conditions  of  his 
quest  to  set  about  righting  them.  If  his  present 
boarding-house  do  not  offer  moral  food,  and  he 
can  find  none  that  does,  he  must  set  up  his  own 
housekeeping,  no  matter  how  modest  it  may  be, 
and  he  must  not  rest  until  he  has  idealized  the 

130 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


taking  of  food ;  for  if  he  be  made  as  most  of 
us  are,  it  is  an  undertaking  that  he  must  engage 
in  more  than  a  thousand  times  a  year,  —  over 
seventy  thousand  times  in  the  course  of  the  tra- 
ditional lifetime ! 

•The  world  of  ideas  seems  to  stretch  over  a 
belt  of  country  of  which  the  40th  parallel  of 
north  latitude  is  approximately  the  medial  line. 
In  this  region,  during  the  greater  part  of  the 
year,  clothing  is  a  necessity  second  only  in  im- 
perativeness to  food,  and  socially  the  necessity 
covers  the  twelvemonth.  During  almost  his  en- 
tire waking  life,  and  certainly  during  his  entire 
social  life,  the  typical  civilized  man  is  clothed. 
After  food,  clothing  is  the  most  important  article 
in  the  morality  of  things.  The  moral  person 
must  see  to  it  that  he  is  properly  clothed.  It  is 
very  much  his  business  to  discover  whether  for 
his  temperament  and  occupation,  cotton  or  wool 
or  linen  is  the  best  sort  of  underwear ;  to  decide 
upon  such  weight  of  coat  and  waistcoat  and  all 
the  rest  that  they  shall  neither  burden  nor  ex- 
pose ;  to  have  his  feet  so  protected  that  the  worst 
weather  cannot  bring  colds  and  sore  throats. 

But  the  most  hygienic  of  clothing  would  still 
be  unsuccessful,  if  it  made  one  an  object  of  re- 
mark. The  remark  may  be  rude  and  out  of  place 
and  altogether  quite  contemptible,  but  it  is  as 
much  of  a  reality  as  the  east  wind,  and  it  is  quite 

131 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

worth  while  to  provide  against  it.  In  comparison 
to  astronomical  magnitudes,  it  is  a  very  small  thing 
whether  a  man  wear  a  dinner  coat  or  not,  but  in 
communities  where  the  wearing  of  it  is  de  rigueur, 
the  independence  of  refusal  is  certainly  worth 
much  less  than  the  good  company  which  our  back- 
woodsman might  have  enjoyed  had  he  chosen  to 
conform.  Most  of  the  radical  departures  from 
customary  habits  in  dress  are  the  result  of  inverted 
ideas  of  magnitude,  the  paying  tithe  of  mint, 
and  anise,  and  cummin,  and  the  omitting  of  the 
weightier  matters  of  the  law.  The  Shakers,  with 
their  insistence  upon  the  moral  superiority  of 
hooks  and  eyes  over  buttons,  and  the  Quakers, 
with  their  conspicuous  attention  to  matters  of 
dress,  are  organized  examples  of  a  pettiness  in 
the  moral  outlook  of  which  individual  examples 
can  be  found  no  further  afield  than  in  one's  own 
self. 

The  higher  function  of  food  is  to  please,  as 
well  as  to  nourish,  and  to  become  in  the  par- 
taking an  occasion  for  social  comradeship  of  a 
high  order.  The  higher  function  of  clothing  is  to 
delight  the  eye  as  well  as  protect  the  body.  It 
ought  to  be  the  occasion  of  pleasure  of  a  very 
real  sort.  Men,  being  mostly  homely,  can  do 
little  in  this  direction  beyond  the  modest  role  of 
making  themselves  as  little  inartistic  as  Nature 
and  the  tailor  will  allow.    But  even  this  limited 

132 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


field  need  not  be  neglected.  The  dullest  of  us, 
with  only  a  few  moments'  reflection,  can  learn 
what  is  possible  and  what  impossible ;  can  learn 
the  coarser  generalizations  of  dress,  that  freckles 
and  check  suits,  colored  shirts  and  gay  ties,  do 
not  go  well  together,  and  other  obvious  maxims. 
With  women  and  children,  however,  the  field  of 
effort  is  much  more  worth  while.  Here  beauty 
deserves  heightenilig.  We  may  deplore  the  atti- 
tude of  mind  of  the  woman  whom  Emerson 
quotes,  the  woman  in  whom  the  sense  of  being 
well  dressed  exceeded  in  comfort  even  the  con- 
solations of  religion,  and  yet  feel  that  it  is  a 
large  part  of  the  morality  of  dress  to  add  to  the 
beauty  and  delight  of  the  world,  instead  of  deep- 
ening its  depression.  Perhaps  even  men,  when  a 
more  wholesome  life  of  occupation  makes  them 
once  more  handsome,  may  undertake  a  more 
courageous  dress. 

It  is  commonly  thought  that  people  spend  too 
much  time  in  thinking  of  clothes,  and  especially 
that  women  do.  This  may  be  true  in  the  wear- 
ing of  them,  but  judging  by  results,  one  would 
not  say  in  the  designing  of  them.  The  right 
time  to  think  about  clothes  is  at  the  time  of  pur- 
chase, and  to  think  so  effectively  that  the  after 
attention  will  be  free. 

The  moral  person  must  be  properly  fed  and 
properly  dressed,  not  only  as  a  matter  of  legiti- 

133 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

mate  pleasure  to  himself  and  others,  but  also 
that  he  may  have  the  full  health  and  spirits 
needed  for  the  fulfillment  of  the  higher  destiny 
of  human  accomplishment. 

In  point  of  importance,  shelter  follows  food 
and  dress,  and  the  morality  of  things  requires 
adequate  and  beautiful  shelter.  It  is  not  a  mat- 
ter of  moral  indifference,  the  sort  of  home  a  man 
makes  for  himself.  It  is  a  matter  of  high  impor- 
tance. The  home  is  the  setting  of  a  hfe,  the 
source  of  health  and  strength  and  courage  and 
delight,  or  the  source  of  their  opposites.  We 
Anglo-Saxons  have  very  strong  feelings  about  the 
home,  and  it  is  a  large  source  of  our  power  and 
supremacy.  Houses  have  very  real  atmospheres. 
Some  are  bare  and  repellent,  no  matter  how  much 
spoil  of  foreign  travel  be  heaped  in  all  corners. 
Others,  for  reasons  that  it  would  perhaps  puzzle 
us  to  state,  hold  out  invisible  hands  of  welcome. 
Do  I  like  my  home  ;  am  I  happy  here ;  is  it  the 
very  best  that  I  can  make  for  myself,  in  point  of 
sanitation,  convenience,  comfort,  beauty,  personal 
suitableness  and  hospitality,  the  source  and  centre 
of  genuine  human  living  ?  These  are  the  incisive 
questions  that  the  moral  person,  be  he  benedict 
or  bachelor,  must  ask  himself  and  must  answer. 
If  the  answers  be  negative,  if  the  home  do  not 
bear  this  moral  scrutiny,  do  not  honestly  satisfy 
the  master  of  it,  there  is  but  one  thing  to  do, 

134 


THE    MORAL   PERSON 


and  that  thing  is  assuredly  not  to  put  up  with  it. 
It  is  to  go  to  work  sturdily  and  create  the  sort  of 
home  that  will  satisfy  the  inner  spirit.  The  man 
or  woman  too  apathetic,  too  lazy,  too  unambitious 
to  do  this,  may  not  pass  as  moral,  for  something  of 
efficiency  and  worth  has  been  omitted  that  may 
not  be  omitted,  and  a  distinctly  lower  level  of 
life  has  been  consented  to. 

There  are  many  instances  where  the  utmost 
effort  has  been  put  forth  and  the  results  are  still 
poor,  some  shabby  little  house,  some  pitiable  ten- 
ement, but  there  are  many  more  instances  where 
results  that  are  poor  might  have  been  made  ap- 
preciably better,  if  only  the  idea  of  morality 
had  been  causational  enough  and  vital  enough 
to  perceive  the  problem  and  attempt  it.  The 
man  who  lives  wretchedly  seven  days  out  of  the 
week,  and  sings  through  his  nose  for  an  hour 
on  Sunday,  under  the  impression  that  he  is  a 
moral  person,  is  suffering  from  the  same  sort  of 
inverted  ideas  of  value  as  beset  ignorance  in  all 
times  and  places.  It  is  his  very  special  and  indi- 
vidual business  to  set  to  work  and  realize  heaven 
here  and  now,  to  drink  to  the  full  that  larger 
measure  of  life,  that  flood  of  good  fortune,  which 
comes  from  decent  and  beautiful  home  life. 

I  am  not  forgetting  that  the  ultimate  charm 
of  every  home  does  not  reside  with  the  architect 
or   furnisher,    is    not    determined   by    location. 

135  • 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

These  contribute  to  the  proximate  charm.  The 
ultimate  charm  rests  with  the  inmates.  They 
create  the  final  verdict,  for  just  as  they  react  on 
the  things  around  them,  and  adjust  them  to 
greater  advantage,  so  they  react  on  one  another 
and  on  us,  determining  our  attitude  towards  the 
whole,  and  declaring  almost  audibly  whether  or 
not  the  result  shall  make  for  happiness. 

The  personnel  of  the  home  is  not  a  matter  of 
chance.  The  man  in  pursuit  of  worth  attracts 
people  of  worth,  and  creates  worth  both  in  him- 
self and  in  those  around  him.  Even  love,  with 
all  its  traditional  blindness,  is  the  unerring  mark 
of  common  affinities.  The  wife  and  children  who 
make  the  spirit  of  the  home,  and  add  so  much  to 
the  reality  of  a  man's  life,  are  of  his  own  choos- 
ing, and  stand  in  vital  relation  to  his  own  nature. 
Whether  they  be  fine  or  not  fine  is  not  at  all  a 
matter  of  caprice,  but  the  definite  result  of  defi- 
nite causes.  Marriage  is  commonly  regarded  as  a 
lottery,  and  it  must  be  so  to  the  man  who  makes 
it  his  first  serious  essay  in  the  study  of  human 
nature.  But  it  is  something  much  finer  and  more 
moral  than  this  to  the  man  who  has  come  into 
control  of  his  own  life,  and  has  made  some  pro- 
gress in  the  idealization  of  his  social  relations. 

As  life  becomes  more  complex  and  subtle,  and 
men  and  women  grow  more  reflective,  there  must 
inevitably  result  a  greater  company  of  bachelors 

136 


THE    MORAL   PERSON 


and  spinsters,  not  people  who  disapprove  of  mar- 
riage in  the  abstract,  not  cold-hearted  people  by 
any  means,  but  people  who  dehberately  give 
over  the  intimate  comradeship  of  wife  or  husband 
for  what  seem  to  them  excellent  reasons,  possibly 
lack  of  health  or  means,  perhaps  a  failure  to 
find  the  right  person,  sometimes  from  excessive 
ideality  in  requirement.  These  unattached  people 
must  still  find  shelter,  and  if  they  be  mora^ 
people,  it  must  not  only  be  hygienic  and  beauti- 
ful, but  soul-satisfying  as  well.  It  is  the  material 
setting  of  a  life,  and  highly  important  to  the 
success  of  the  life. 

The  customary  solution  is  the  hotel  or  board- 
ing-house, a  solution  which  in  rare  cases  is  highly 
successful,  but  in  the  majority  of  cases  is  a  blank 
failure.  And  it  is  a  failure  because  it  places  the 
important  questions  of  food  and  shelter  and 
human  atmosphere  in  the  keeping  of  some  one 
else,  and  of  some  one  commonly  less  evolved 
than  one's  self.  I  am  responsible  to  myself  for 
these  matters,  and  I  have  no  right  to  delegate 
them  to  any  one  less  competent.  If  I  do,  I  am 
guilty  of  the  same  sort  of  abdication  that  Rous- 
seau was  guilty  of  when  he  sent  his  children  to 
the  foundling  asylum,  or  that  the  state  is  guilty 
of  when  it  hands  over  its  own  inalienable  right  of 
eminent  domain  to  some  private,  profit-hungry 
corporation.    These   are   all   forms  of  exploita- 

137 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

tion,  in  which  the  immorality  resides  quite  as 
much  with  those  who  allow  the  exploiting  as 
with  those  who  do  it.  The  same  frankness  which 
declares  hotel  and  boarding-house  to  be  improper 
shelter  for  most  moral  persons  must  also  admit 
that  the  people  who  elect  this  sort  of  shelter  are 
guilty  of  gross  ill-breeding  when  they  growl  and 
complain.  If  I  do  not  like  mine  inn,  and  mine 
host  honestly  desires  to  know  why,  in  order  that 
he  may  improve  his  hospitality,  it  is  gracious 
to  enlighten  him  and  help  him  to  better  things. 
But  if  mine  host  be  satisfied  and  I  be  not,  there 
is  but  one  self-respecting  thing  to  do,  and  that 
is  to  leave.  In  stopping  with  him,  I  accept  the 
conditions  which  he  imposes;  I  am  the  respon- 
sible person. 

In  the  majority  of  cases,  even  the  bachelor  and 
spinster  must  undertake  their  own  housekeeping 
if  they  wish  to  satisfy  the  morahty  of  things. 
Many  already  do  this,  and  surround  themselves 
with  other  persons  of  worth,  —  relatives,  friends, 
servants,  —  who  not  only  create  the  right  sort 
of  environment  for  the  nominal  head  of  the 
house,  but  also  find  in  it  the  proper  atmosphere 
for  their  own  lives. 

This  individual  shelter  has  the  negative  func- 
tion of  protecting  the  moral  person  from  unsuit- 
able food,  apartments,  and  atmosphere,  and  so 
contributing  materially  to  his  development.    It 

138 


THE    MORAL    PERSON 


has  also  the  more  positive  function  of  enabling 
him  to  make  his  own  life  a  social  centre  of 
greater  effectiveness  and  worth.  The  men  and 
women  who  decline  a  home  of  their  own,  however 
humble  it  may  be,  commonly  decline  a  social 
opportunity  of  great  moral  value,  as  well  as  the 
condition  of  increased  individual  worth. 

Proper  food  and  dress  and  shelter  require 
money.  To  this  extent,  the  getting  of  money  is 
a  part  of  the  moral  life.  It  is  one  of  the  most 
curious  and  persistent  inversions  in  life  as  it  is, 
as  opposed  to  life  as  it  ought  to  be,  that  money, 
which  is  properly  but  a  means  towards  increased 
human  wealth,  is  transfigured  into  an  end,  and 
is  pursued  at  the  price  of  human  wealth,  at 
the  price  of  that  very  end  which  both  theoreti- 
cally and  practically  it  must  serve  in  order  to  be 
any  part  of  genuine  human  desire.  But  this  opens 
up  that  large  chapter  in  morality,  the  morality 
of  occupations.  Here  we  may  consider  only  the 
opposite  side  of  the  question,  the  immorality  of 
not  having  enough  money  decently  to  supply 
those  material  possessions  upon  which  a  moral 
life  is  necessarily  based.  The  deficit  is  commonly 
the  result  of  one  of  two  causes,  —  either  ineffec- 
tive work,  by  which  the  supply  of  money  is  too 
meagre  to  satisfy  one's  wholesome  needs,  or  else 
that  over-prudence  which  saves  money  that  ought 
morally  to  be  expended  in  procuring  decent  liv- 

139 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

ing  conditions.  The  moral  person  must  have 
such  industrial  efficiency  as  will  make  him  the 
possessor  of  sufficient  daily  revenue,  and  of  this 
daily  revenue  he  may  morally  save  only  that  sur- 
plus which  remains  after  he  has  provided  suitable 
food  and  dress  and  shelter  for  himself  and  those 
dependent  upon  him. 

The  young  man  who  marries  a  wife  whom  he 
cannot  decently  support,  who  brings  children 
into  the  world  whom  he  cannot  decently  provide 
for  and  equip,  is  an  immoral  person.  The  wo- 
man who  becomes  the  partner  of  such  enfeebling 
poverty  must  share  the  blame  as  well  as  the  suf- 
fering. But  what  shall  one  say  of  the  children  ? 
They  were  not  consulted,  did  not  elect  immoral 
parents,  or,  so  far  as  we  know,  did  not  even  elect 
to  be  born.  They  came  as  the  result  of  that 
second  most  primitive  of  human  instincts,  the 
instinct  of  race  preservation.  They  are  here,  and 
are  face  to  face  with  a  great  problem,  —  the 
problem  of  decent  livelihood,  —  which  they  are 
so  little  prepared  to  solve  that  in  many  cases  one 
must  say  with  discouraging  certainty  that  the 
solution  is  morally  impossible. 

The  problem  of  childhood  is  one  of  the  knot- 
tiest that  the  moralist  is  called  upon  to  consider. 
The  doctrine  of  Karma,  the  doctrine  that  in  the 
present  life  the  human  soul  must  reap  the  fruit 
of  deeds  done  in  a  past  life,  offers  the  shadow  of 

140 


THE    MORAL   PERSON 


an  explanation  for  that  mysterious  thing,  individ- 
ual destiny,  and  seems  to  justify  the  misfortune 
of  an  unfavorable  birth.  Those  who  advance  the 
doctrine  of  Karma  do  it  on  what  they  regard  as 
adequate  witness.  The  doctrine  has  many  other 
names,  —  predestination,  destiny,  fate,  —  all  in- 
volving the  inevitableness,  and  some  of  them 
involving  the  justification.  In  the  absence  of 
any  valid  objective  proof,  the  moralist  may  not 
so  calmly  devote  the  children  to  an  unescapable 
evil  fortune,  and  the  community  to  so  low  a 
level  of  welfare.  This  is  indeed  a  highly  immoral 
administration  of  things,  which  foresees  the 
absence  of  worth,  and  is  not  sufficiently  fore- 
armed to  rescue  the  day  for  better  things.  The 
more  responsible  social  view  is  now  beginning  to 
prevail,  and  promises  in  time  to  be  less  element- 
ary and  more  efPective. 

There  are,  broadly  speaking,  two  ways  of 
dealing  with  the  problem.  One  is  to  keep  the 
children  from  being  born,  and  the  other  is  to 
keep  them  from  meeting  their  natural  destiny  of 
a  hopeless  handicap. 

The  first  way  is  radical,  but  will  doubtless  pre- 
vail as  civilization  becomes  less  superficial.  The 
law  is  already  very  strenuous  in  denying  the 
right  of  any  man,  no  matter  what  his  strength 
and  possessions,  to  attempt  to  support  two  fami- 
lies.   It  is  equally  strenuous  in  refusing  all  immi- 

141 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

grants  who  come  empty-handed.  These  measures 
are  manifestly  contrary  to  the  individual  idea  of 
good  fortune  of  those  restrained  by  them,  but 
they  are  justified  by  the  objective  standards  of 
social  welfare.  In  the  first  instance,  monogamy 
is  insisted  upon  both  for  the  sake  of  the  indi- 
vidual and  of  society.  In  the  second  case,  the  in- 
dividual is  denied  what  would  doubtless  be  a 
betterment  of  his  fortunes,  in  order  to  limit  the 
national  burden  of  pauperism.  It  may  be  open 
to  criticism  on  humanitarian  grounds,  this  exclu- 
sion of  the  oppressed  of  other  lands,  the  very 
people  for  whom  America  was  instituted,  but  it 
is  at  least  regarded  as  expedient  by  the  majority. 
From  the  viewpoint  of  both  good  fortune  and 
social  welfare,  the  case  of  the  unborn  is  much 
stronger  than  the  case  of  the  immigrant.  The 
latter  is  already  here,  and  must  face  the  problem 
of  making  the  most  of  himself,  no  matter  how 
difficult  the  problem  may  be.  But  social  justice 
demands  that  children  shall  not  come  into  the 
world  so  heavily  handicapped,  empty-handed  as 
regards  the  better  things  of  life,  personal  endow- 
ment and  wholesome  opportunity,  full-handed  as 
regards  the  burdens,  personal  defect  and  poverty. 
In  more  causational  times,  marriage  and  child- 
birth will  be  legitimate  and  possible  only  where 
there  are  normal  health  and  capacity,  and  a 
reasonable  assurance  of  support. 

142 


THE   MORAL   PERSON 


Just  now  the  newspapers  are  filled  with  the 
praise  of  large  families,  and  gentlemen  in  high 
places  are  calling  bachelors  and  spinsters  names. 
But  no  such  generalizations  are  possible.  The 
large  family  may  be  a  part  of  the  morality  of 
life,  or  a  part  of  the  immorality,  and  as  the 
matter  commonly  works  out,  it  is  the  latter. 
Those  who  speak  so  solemnly  about  the  possibil- 
ities of  race  suicide,  and  the  crime  of  it,  are 
mixing  up  means  and  ends  in  an  altogether  un- 
warrantable fashion.  They  quite  justify  Matthew 
Arnold's  humorous  comment :  — 

^  One  has  heard  people,  fresh  from  reading 
certain  articles  of  the  Times  on  the  Registrar- 
General's  returns  of  marriages  and  births  in  this 
country,  who  would  talk  of  our  large  English 
families  in  quite  a  solemn  strain,  as  if  they  had 
something  in  itself  beautiful,  elevating,  and  mer- 
itorious in  them;  as  if  the  British  Philistine 
would  have  only  to  present  himself  before  the 
Great  Judge  with  his  twelve  children,  in  order  to 
be  received  among  the  sheep  as  a  matter  of  right ! ' 

The  second  way  out  is  less  effective,  but  is 
imperative  if  the  more  radical  first  way  be  de- 
clined. It  is  the  way  of  allowing  the  supply  of 
incompetent  and  destitute  children  to  continue 
unchecked,  and  of  burdening  the  competent  part 
of  the  community  with  their  betterment  and  par- 
tial support.  At  the  present  moment  this  is  done 

143 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

in  a  fragmentary  manner.  The  public  schools 
attempt  somewhat  feebly  to  put  the  children  of 
the  poor  in  the  way  to  a  better  fortune.  Reforma- 
tories attempt  to  correct  perverted  ideas  and 
desires,  and  to  bring  them  into  line  with  social 
welfare.  Asylums,  prisons,  and  death  penalties 
remove  the  most  incorrigible  for  shorter  or  longer 
periods.  But  more  and  more  this  beneficent  social 
work  is  passing  from  symptoms  back  to  causes, 
and  is  putting  the  emphasis  on  prevention,  rather 
than  on  cure.  Education  properly  begins  with 
the  ancestors,  in  having  the  children  well  born. 
No  one  who  has  moved  among  the  ill-equipped 
children  of  the  very  poor,  who  has  studied  the 
*  special  classes  '  for  backward  children  in  the 
Massachusetts  public  schools,  who  has  visited 
the  institutions  for  feeble-minded  children  at 
Elwyn  and  elsewhere,  can  doubt  for  a  moment 
that  so  hideous  a  social  malady  deserves  the  most 
rigid  quarantine. 

To  be  well  fed,  well  clothed,  well  sheltered, 
and  to  have  such  daily  income  as  will  make  this 
material  well-being  assured,  is  the  homely  and 
practical  duty  of  every  moral  person.  It  is  not 
the  end  of  virtue,  but  it  is  the  beginning.  And 
moral  criticism,  here  as  elsewhere,  concerns  itself 
both  with  the  essential  worth  of  our  ideas  of 
material  well-being,  and  the  degree  of  success 
with  which  we  realize  them. 

144 


THE   MORAL    PERSON 


The  attitude  of  the  moral  person  towards  the 
more  subtle,  more  spiritual,  more  important  part 
of  morahty,  of  which  this  material  well-being  is 
but  the  foundation  and  beginning,  will  depend 
upon  his  general  intelligence.  His  problem  grows 
very  complex,  for  it  includes  questions  of  purely 
personal  morality,  of  occupation,  of  cardinal  and 
minor  virtues,  of  social  relations,  of  cosmic  out- 
look ;  and  while  all  these  questions  are,  in  their 
essence,  much  the  same  for  all  men,  they  all  re- 
quire an  individual  statement  which  each  man 
must  work  out  and  formulate  for  himself.  But 
those  who  have  not  yet  come  into  an  orderly  and 
law-abiding  universe  are  distrustful  of  human 
experience  and  of  the  authority  of  its  teaching. 
They  are  prone  to  turn  with  sincere  eagerness 
to  some  one  of  those  other  sources  of  authority 
which  carry  with  them  the  avowal  of  superhu- 
man origin,  and  appeal  more  dramatically  to  the 
imagination. 

It  is  true  that  by  thus  divesting  the  moral  law 
of  all  external "  authority,  one  does  run  some  risk 
of  weakening  the  law  as  a  deterrent  from  evil 
and  an  incentive  to  good.  The  belief  that  cer- 
tain action  is  inherently  and  mysteriously  right 
or  wrong  does  lead  many  an  unreasoning  soul 
into  some  semblance  of  virtue,  a  semblance  which 
might  be  obliterated  by  the  suspicion  that  the 
action  is  quite  permissible,  if  one  stand  ready  to 

145 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

take  the  immediate  and  seemingly  transitory  con- 
sequences. It  is  also  true  that  the  moral  law  is 
frequently  contravened  by  men  who  accept  the 
authority  of  human  experience,  and  who  in  most 
of  their  dealings  live  up  to  its  teaching,  but  who 
find  it  convenient  from  time  to  time  to  act  upon 
the  principle  that  the  end  justifies  the  means, 
and  consequently  to  try  to  gain  a  worthy  end  by 
unworthy  means.  Their  sincerity  is  undoubted. 
The  breach  comes  to  them  as  a  temptation,  and 
a  temptation  with  a  certain  godlike  face  to  it. 
If  right  be  right  and  wrong  be  wrong  solely  be- 
cause of  their  results,  then  it  is  an  easy  conclu- 
sion that  the  experience  of  the  race  is  always 
open  to  correction  and  enlargement.  It  is  a 
temptation  to  a  courageous  moral  man  to  dis- 
regard the  generalizations  of  other  men  and 
become  a  law  unto  himself.  It  is  as  if,  walking 
in  the  garden  of  the  gods,  he  had  tasted  of  the 
tree  of  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  and,  to 
that  extent  at  least,  become  as  one  of  them. 

Both  these  types,  the  conventional  soul  yield- 
ing under  the  stress  of  a  too-sudden  freedom, 
and  the  heroic  soul  willing  to  dare,  and  if  need 
be  to  suffer,  in  order  to  test  the  limits  of  the 
moral  law,  may  be  guilty  of  large  wrong-doing, 
and  to  the  extent  of  their  offending  must  pay 
the  allotted  penalty.  What  they  have  declined 
to  learn  as  the  result  of  the  race  experience,  they 

146 


THE    MORAL   PERSON 


will  be  forced  to  learn  as  the  result  of  individual 
experience.  And  in  doing  this  they  will  have  to 
taste  the  same  bitterness,  the  same  mortal  pain, 
that  has  been  the  portion  of  the  race.  Where 
the  offense  concerns  themselves  alone,  they  will 
pay  for  it  in  personal  suffering ;  where  it  con- 
cerns society,  they  must  pay  the  penalty  that 
law  provides. 

But  even  under  the  older  view  of  morals,  the 
view  that  gave  to  morality  a  superhuman  sanc- 
tion, human  transgressions  have  been  many  and 
terrible.  Some  of  the  offenders  have  disbelieved 
in  the  divine  nature  of  the  laws  they  were  break- 
ing. But  the  majority,  it  would  be  safe  to  say, 
havebeheved, — that  is,  believed  theoretically, — 
and  in  spite  of  the  belief,  have  offended.  Or 
perhaps  they  have  doubted  the  uniformity  of 
the  divine  government.  They  have  attempted  to 
make  exceptions,  just  as  the  man  who  accepts 
the  human  origin  of  morality  attempts  to  make 
exceptions.  They  have  thought  in  a  vague  way 
to  pass  unseen  in  the  swarming  crowd  of  human- 
ity, and  so  escape  the  eye  of  the  Eternal.  As  a 
deterrent,  the  old  view  has  not  always  been  suc- 
cessful. As  a  deterrent,  the  new  view  is  not 
always  successful.  But  in  making  his  morality 
depend  upon  human  experience  rather  than  upon 
an  extra-human,  cosmic  will,  the  empirical  moral- 
ist does  not  deny  the  existence  of  such  a  supreme 

147 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

cause ;  he  merely  asserts  that  he  can  know  only 
so  much  of  it  as  experience  reveals.  In  doing 
this,  our  moral  person  enters  into  the  inner  con- 
sciousness of  life,  and  by  reason  of  the  high 
responsibility  which  he  assumes,  becomes  an 
earnest,  practical  seeker  after  the  good. 

The  race  is  divided  into  leaders  and  followers. 
The  leaders  point  the  way,  the  others  follow  at  a 
distance.  The  moral  leaders  have  not  been  moral 
persons  in  the  customary  acceptance  of  the  term. 
They  have  not  been  the  bringers  of  smooth 
phrases,  but  rather  the  bringers  of  the  sword, 
innovators,  breakers  of  the  old  law  in  order  to 
establish  the  new  law.  For  the  old  law  must  con- 
tinually be  broken ;  it  rests  on  experience  as  it 
was.  And  the  new  law  must  constantly  be  set 
up  ;  it  rests  on  experience  as  it  is.  But  these 
prophets  of  God,  as  we  tried  to  point  out  in  the 
chapter  on  Right  and  Wrong,  do  not  disregard 
experience.  They  speak  from  a  deeper  experi- 
ence. So  unique  is  their  message  that  it  appears 
to  be  either  the  intuition  of  a  vast  ancestral  expe- 
rience, or  else  the  word  of  a  greater  soul,  more 
deeply  taught  than  those  commonly  met  with  on 
earth. 

The  moral  person  must  be  both  a  conservative 
and  a  radical,  —  a  conservative  in  holding  fast 
to  all  that  is  essentially  good ;  a  radical  in  throw- 
ing over  the  pseudo-good  and  in  exploring  new 

148 


THE    MORAL    PERSON 


territory.  In  a  word,  he  must  be  judicial,  he 
must  know.  The  moral  life  is  not,  then,  a  dumb 
following  of  the  code,  —  it  is  a  constant  exercise 
of  judgment.  And  these  judgments  must  become 
increasingly  subtle  and  penetrating  as  the  moral 
person  comes  to  handle  those  more  subtle  and 
complex  problems  to  be  reached  in  succeeding 
chapters. 


VIII 

INDIVIDUAL  MORALITY 

THE  major  and  all-inclusive  duty  of  a  man  is 
to  himself.  It  is  self-realization  in  the  high- 
est sense  of  the  word.  It  is  selfishness,  if  one 
use  the  term  etymologieally,  to  mean  attention 
to  the  concerns  of  the  larger  self.  Commonly  the 
term  selfishness  has  disagreeable  connotations.  It 
stands  for  the  assertion  of  that  smaller  self  which 
is  the  denial  of  morals  in  place  of  their  fulfill- 
ment. In  the  present  chapter  I  use  the  word 
^  self '  to  mean  the  ideal  self,  that  larger  self 
which  is  a  man's  potential  possession,  as  opposed 
to  that  outer  world  of  human  and  non-human 
nature  which  reacts  upon  him,  upon  which  he 
reacts,  but  which  does  not  belong  to  him  in  any 
intimate  and  personal  way. 

That  the  self  is  and  should  be  the  object  of 
major  concern  to  every  moral  person  is  made 
evident  by  two  considerations,  either  one  of  which 
is  conclusive. 

In  the  first  place,  the  self  represents  a  man's 
direct  responsibility.  For  the  rest  of  the  universe, 
he  is,  for  the  most  part,  wholly  irresponsible.  The 
rain  falls  on  the  just  and  on  the  unjust.    The 

150 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


great  events  of  the  cosmos  have  little  apparent 
regard  for  the  individual  man.  He  has  his  own 
important  part  to  play,  and  plays  it  nobly  or 
otherwise,  but  his  sole  moral  concern  is  limited 
to  this.  He  may  be  intellectually  and  sympathet- 
ically interested  in  the  great  world-drama,  and  it 
is  a  pretty  poor  sort  of  man  who  is  not,  but  to 
vastly  the  greater  part  of  the  drama  he  stands  in 
no  causational  relation,  and  can  claim  neither 
praise  nor  blame  for  creation.  If  man  be  a  free 
agent,  he  is  responsible  for  himself,  and  for  such 
part  of  the  world  of  affairs  as  comes  within  the 
sphere  of  his  influence.  But  for  the  world-order 
as  a  whole,  not  the  most  ardent  advocate  of  free- 
will would  think  of  making  him  even  remotely 
responsible.  It  is  only  within  the  sphere  of  his 
personal  life  that  other  persons  and  things  can 
make  their  appeal,  and  claim  his  service.  But 
it  seems  that  this  outer  circle  is  determined  by 
the  self,  and  is  very  far  from  being  a  fixed  and 
independent  quantity.  It  is  small  or  large,  accord- 
ing to  the  dimensions  of  the  self.  The  attitude 
of  the  man  towards  the  events  around  him  is 
not  determined  by  the  events  and  their  claims, 
but  by  his  perception  of  the  significance  of  the 
events,  and  his  own  idea  of  possible  service.  His 
sphere  of  influence  is  a  thing  of  his  own  creat- 
ing, and  a  highly  important  part  of  individual 
morality. 

151 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

In  the  second  place,  as  we  have  been  insisting 
all  along,  a  man's  life,  quite  apart  from  others, 
is  a  very  small  part  indeed  of  the  total  of  his  life. 
When  society  wishes  to  impose  its  crudest  punish- 
ment, it  dooms  a  man  to  solitary  confinement. 
This  does  not  rob  him  of  life  as  a  mere  animal 
process,  but  it  robs  him  most  effectively  of  the 
human  content  of  life.  He  is  as  good  as  dead, 
just  as  a  man  on  a  desert  island  is  as  good  as 
dead,  or  an  anchorite  in  his  cell.  Probably  the 
only  thing  that  keeps  the  prisoner  and  the  cast- 
away from  utter  hopelessness  and  insanity  is  the 
faint  expectation  that  some  turn  of  fortune  may 
yet  restore  them  to  human  companionship.  In 
the  case  of  the  anchorite,  the  expectation  is  more 
vivid,  but  it  is  of  a  companionship  still  more  ex- 
alted. Even  a  man's  animal  wants  depend  largely 
upon  his  fellows.  Few  of  us,  alone  and  unaided, 
could  compass  the  most  primitive  satisfactions 
in  the  way  of  food  and  clothing  and  shelter.  At 
the  first  touch  of  incapacitating  disease,  all  would 
be  up  with  us.  Nature,  too,  seems  to  have  small 
concern  for  the  solitary  man.  As  the  last  of  his 
kind,  his  fate  is  a  matter  of  indifference.  When 
we  turn  from  mere  animal  existence,  a  gift  of 
more  than  doubtful  value,  to  the  real  content  of 
a  human  life,  the  social  dependence  of  the  indi- 
vidual is  complete.  It  would  be  appalling  were  it 
not  met  by  an  equally  imperative  dependence  on 

152 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


the  part  of  his  fellows.  They  are  necessary  to  him, 
truly,  but  he  likewise  is  necessary  to  them.  It  is 
a  case  of  beneficent  complicity.  This  human  in- 
tercourse is  the  medium  in  which  the  greater  part 
of  the  individual  life  is  played  out.  The  only  way 
a  man  may  escape  it  is  to  abdicate  life  itself.  The 
significant  part  of  the  individual  life  consists  in 
just  these  human,  social  relations.  In  these  rela- 
tions a  man  must  reaHze  himself,  must  satisfy  his 
affections,  his  intellectual  curiosity,  his  spiritual 
aspiration.  His  own  sense  of  good  fortune,  quite 
as  much  as  the  objective  standard  of  welfare, 
requires  the  idealization  of  these  relations.  His 
happiness,  and  therefore  his  moral  life,  depend 
upon  it.  Looking  at  the  matter  from  his  point 
of  view,  the  extension  and  perfecting  of  human 
intercourse  is  the  greatest  part,  almost  the  whole 
part,  of  individual  duty,  of  duty  to  the  self. 

It  is  quite  possible  to  turn  the  matter  com- 
pletely round  and  state  the  problem,  as  it  is  usu- 
ally stated,  from  the  social  point  of  view.  These 
duties  of  social  intercourse  and  idealized  human 
relations  are  classed  as  duties  to  the  neighbor  and 
to  society.  They  are  stated  as  essentially  duties 
to  others,  and  group  themselves  under  the  gen- 
eral name  of  altruism.  As  such,  they  are  looked 
upon  as  opposed  to  those  self-regarding  duties 
which  constitute  a  proper  egoism.  To  many,  the 
moral  life  is  just  this  conflict  between  the  two 

153 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

sets  of  duties,  between  altruism  and  egoism,  with 
morality  thrusting  forth  the  one,  and  inclination 
urging  the  claims  of  the  other.  This  method  of 
presentation  makes  hfe  essentially  militant,  and 
is  supposed  to  be  the  strenuous  and  robust 
method.  It  certainly  makes  our  would-be  moral 
soldier  excessively  self-conscious,  for  the  enemy 
is  within  the  gates,  and  constantly  on  the  watch 
for  our  good  knight,  to  catch  him  napping. 
When  this  happens,  inclination  whips  moraHty, 
and  the  day  is  lost. 

It  is  possible  to  approach  the  question  of 
human  intercourse  from  either  end,  the  individ- 
ual end  or  the  social  end,  but  it  is  not  a  matter 
of  moral  indifference  which  approach  we  choose. 
By  making  ideal  human  relations  essentially  a 
duty  to  others,  in  place  of  to  the  self,  the  issue 
seems  to  me  needlessly  obscured.  Every  question 
of  duty  must  be  regarded  finally  through  the 
individual  eyes  of  the  agent.  It  is  he  who  must 
perceive  the  duty,  must  accomplish  it,  and  must 
in  the  retrospect  be  so  far  assured  of  its  validity 
that  he  would  willingly  do  it  again.  He  may 
theorize  as  much  as  he  chooses  about  his  neigh- 
bors' duties,  —  and  sometimes  he  chooses  to  do 
this  to  such  an  extent  that  he  neglects  his  own 
more  obvious  ones,  —  but  he  is  obliged,  by  the 
very  nature  of  the  case,  to  handle  his  own  duties, 
if  he  handle  them  at  all,  from  a  highly  practical 

154 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


and  personal  standpoint.  The  whole  moral  out- 
look becomes  very  artificial  and  uncertain  the 
moment  a  man  abandons  the  solid  ground  of  his 
own  part  in  the  drama,  and  betakes  himself  to  a 
hypothetical  region  which  he  cannot  explore  and 
of  which  he  can  have  no  certified  news.  In  treat- 
ing the  problem  of  human  relations,  one  must 
proceed  from  the  known  to  the  unknown,  and 
the  known  in  this  case  is  one's  own  end  of  the 
relation,  one's  own  genuine  feeHng  and  personal 
experience  and  acquired  knowledge  ;  and  the  un- 
known is  the  other  man's  state,  the  part  that  is 
hidden.  The  part  that  is  not  hidden  is  a  part  of 
one's  own  knowledge,  and  forms  a  part  of  the 
handle  which  a  moral  man  is  glad  to  possess. 
But  he  makes  a  sad  mess  of  it,  if  he  abandon  this 
assured  ground,  and  base  his  solution  not  only 
upon  the  unknown  end  of  the  relation,  but  also 
upon  a  position  at  variance  with  the  known  end. 
The  most  powerful  moral  maxim  is  the  Golden 
Rule,  and  this  expressly  throws  all  action  touch- 
ing others  back  upon  the  personal,  individual 
insight  of  the  agent.  As  he  is  intelligent  and 
moral,  and  he  cannot  be  the  latter  without  be- 
ing the  former,  what  he  would  that  others  do 
unto  him  is  founded  upon  his  personal  and 
private  view  of  good  fortune  chastened  by  the 
social  view  of  welfare.  He  acts,  therefore,  upon 
the  principle  of  worth,  a  principle  vaHd  for  both. 

155 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

To  present  moral  conduct  towards  others  as 
something  doing  essential  violence  to  one's  own 
nature,  instead  of  fulfilling  and  realizing  one's 
nature,  is  not  only  to  falsify  the  experienced  facts 
of  Hfe,  but  to  leave  one  without  assured  ground 
and  motive  for  action.  It  is  to  make  morality 
less  practical  and  less  current. 

By  setting  up  an  essential  antagonism  between 
egoism  and  altruism,  between  the  moral  issues 
when  human  intercourse  is  approached  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  individual  and  of  society, 
there  is  produced  great  obscurity  not  only  with 
regard  to  social  duties,  but  also  with  regard  to 
the  proper  attitude  of  the  individual  towards 
social  intercourse  in  general.  It  leads  to  the  be- 
lief that  the  individual  view  of  good  fortune  is 
really  the  one  that  it  would  be  personally  pleas- 
ant and  profitable  to  follow,  and  that  the  chasten- 
ing of  this  view  due  to  the  social  idea  of  welfare 
is  in  truth  a  concession  to  an  antagonistic  set 
of  duties,  which  one  owes  in  some  mysterious 
way  to  other  people.  But  this,  as  we  saw  in  our 
inquiry  into  worth,  is  a  wholly  false  view.  The 
unchastened  idea  of  good  fortune  is  not  the  path 
of  right  and  happiness.  The  corrective  view  of 
social  welfare  was  not  introduced  to  satisfy  some 
outside  claim  of  an  octopus-like  organism  known 
as  society,  with  a  life  different  in  kind  from  that 
of  the  individual,  and  a  welfare  antagonistic  to 

156 


INDIVIDUAL    MORALITY 


the  welfare  of  the  individual,  but  was  introduced 
solely  for  the  salvation  of  the  individual,  to  teach 
him  in  what  happiness,  or  good  fortune,  really 
consists,  well  knowing  that  when  the  individual 
is  saved,  society  is  sound. 

From  this  point  of  view,  a  point  of  view  to 
be  maintained  throughout  the  present  book,  there 
is  no  conflict  between  egoism  and  altruism.  And 
as  there  is  no  conflict,  so  there  is  no  reconcilia- 
tion either  necessary  or  possible.  One  cannot 
bridge  a  chasm  which  does  not  exist.  Egoism 
and  altruism  are  but  the  subjective  and  the  ob- 
jective aspects  of  human  intercourse,  the  exact 
counterparts  of  good  fortune  and  welfare.  When 
human  intercourse  is  made  sound  and  true,  is 
idealized,  then  worth  is  attained,  and  morality 
made  possible.  It  remains  literally  true  that 
when  a  man  has  performed  his  full  duty  to  him- 
self, he  has  performed  likewise  his  full  duty  to 
his  family,  to  his  neighbor,  to  society,  to  man- 
kind, and  to  the  unseen. 

Strictly  speaking,  then,  one  may  not  speak  of 
individual  morality  and  social  morality,  of  duties 
to  the  self  and  duties  to  the  neighbor,  for  mo- 
rality is  all  of  a  piece.  It  is  right  conduct,  the 
efficient  adjustment  of  means  to  worthy  ends, 
and  conduct  is  an  individual  phenomenon.  But 
it  is  convenient  to  consider  moral  conduct  in  the 
order  of  an  apparently  diminishing  self  and  an 

157 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

apparently  increasing  neighbor,  and  to  consider 
under  the  head  of  individual  morality  that  part 
of  conduct  which  seems  the  most  private  and 
personal. 

One  may  well  begin  with  that  moral  ^  four-in- 
hand'  which  every  seeker  after  good  fortune 
must  seriously  take  up,  the  quadruple  duty  of 
being  strong  and  beautiful  and  accomplished 
and  good. 

The  pursuit  of  the  first  of  these  ends  has 
often  been  undertaken  by  persons  not  at  all 
enamored  of  morality,  and  they  have  even  met 
with  partial  success.  But  it  may  be  shown  that 
not  even  the  most  primitive  of  these  personal 
duties,  the  duty  of  being  strong,  can  be  fulfilled 
by  an  immoral  person.  The  brute-like  strength 
of  the  prize-fighter  is  not  the  sort  of  bodily  per- 
fection which  counts  either  in  terms  of  time  or 
tasks.  To  be  strong,  in  the  moral  sense,  is  to 
have  that  perfect  health  of  body,  that  develop- 
ment of  each  member  and  organ  and  faculty, 
that  will  mean  the  largest  possible  measure  of 
personal  power.  This  finer  health  is  not  satisfied 
by  mere  chest  expansion  and  girth  of  arms  and 
legs.  It  requires  a  nicety  of  organization,  a  fine- 
ness of  tissue,  which  make  the  human  body  a 
highly  efficient  and  serviceable  machine.  Moral- 
ity distinguishes  between  athletics,  the  develop- 
ment of  some  particular  faculty  for  show  pur- 

158 


INDIVIDUAL    MORALITY 


poses  at  the  expense  of  the  other  faculties,  and 
physical  culture,  the  development  of  the  body 
as  a  whole  for  human  purposes. 

These  quadruple  duties  seem  at  first  sight 
highly  individualistic.  One  might  pursue  them 
apparently  without  being  in  the  least  socially 
minded.  But  one  cannot  look  at  them  twice 
without  perceiving  that  by  all  odds  their  larger 
content  is  social.  Personal  strength  and  health 
would  seem  essentially  egoistic,  a  phase  of  indi- 
vidual good  fortune,  unchastened  by  any  ideas 
of  social  welfare.  And  this  impression  is  deep- 
ened by  the  fact  that  social  welfare,  as  commonly 
conceived,  is  frequently  achieved  at  the  cost  of 
individual  health  and  strength,  even  at  the  cost 
of  life.  But  it  will  be  shown  in  the  chapter  on 
Social  Welfare  that  it  is  a  distinctly  false  wel- 
fare, a  veritable  disaster,  which  is  thus  achieved 
at  the  cost  of  individual  good  fortune. 

To  be  strong  is  the  first  of  individual  duties,  for 
it  is  the  first  condition  of  wholesome  happiness. 
To  have  the  body  well  developed,  to  have  arms 
and  legs,  chest  and  thighs,  hands  and  feet,  head 
and  heart,  thoroughly  sound  and  strong ;  to  have 
the  faculties  alert  and  well  trained,  the  seeing 
eye,  the  hearing  ear,  the  cultivated  voice,  the 
skillful  touch,  the  discriminating  smell  and  taste, 
is  the  first  requisite  of  good  fortune.  It  is  the 
human  wealth,  of  which,  as  we  have  said,  there 

159 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

is  enough  to  go  all  round,  and  the  only  sort  of 
wealth  worth  serious  consideration  as  an  end. 
Wealth  in  things  must  always  be  looked  upon  as 
means,  as  significant  only  as  it  ministers  to  this 
human  wealth.  In  America  we  have  not  very 
much  of  this  human  wealth.  The  typical  Ameri- 
can has  sacrificed  his  body  on  a  variety  of  altars, 
to  false  duties,  to  perverted  appetite,  above  all  to 
'business.'  It  is  the  offering  of  Cain,  the  mur- 
derer, and  cannot  be  acceptable  to  the  God  who 
commanded  perfection.  In  good  health,  one  is 
unconscious  of  the  body,  and  the  attention  is 
free  for  the  larger  emotions.  In  superb  health, 
one  adds  to  these  emotions  a  distinct  sense  of 
personal  well-being,  the  exultation  of  strength 
and  power.  Invalidism  is  the  reverse  of  all  this, 
an  out-and-out  immorality,  for  it  makes  good 
fortune  impossible.  It  is  useless  to  urge  that  the 
invalidism  is  unavoidable,  and  not  to  be  dealt 
with  in  this  harsh  fashion.  It  may  be  unavoid- 
able, the  very  natural  and  proper  result  of  health- 
destroying  causes,  but  the  causes  were  avoidable, 
and  the  failure  to  avoid  them  is  a  tremendous 
immorality. 

If  America,  as  a  nation,  be  pursuing  such  ideals 
and  such  policy  that  the  present  bodily  weakness 
characteristic  of  America  is  inevitable,  then  the 
national  life  is  essentially  immoral.  And  this  is 
precisely  what  many  of  us  beheve.    The  pursuit 

160 


INDIVIDUAL    MORALITY 


of  material  ends,  trade,  business,  money,  the 
denial  of  the  sacredness  of  human  personality  and 
integrity,  constitute  a  profound  moral  wrong,  for 
which  the  nation  pays  to-day  in  its  failure  to 
be  glad  and  happy.  And  that  we  do  fail  to  be 
glad  and  happy  must  be  evident  to  every  one 
who  considers  not  himself  alone  and  the  chosen 
few  who  are  following  the  path  of  the  larger 
life,  but  who  seriously  considers,  let  us  say,  one 
hundred  of  his  casual  acquaintances.  Various 
causes  are  assigned  for  this  national  unhappiness. 
It  is  said  that  we  need  more  holidays,  less  am- 
bition, greater  thrift,  more  religion,  —  and  to 
a  certain  extent  this  is  all  true.  But  our  most 
primitive  need  is  for  more  robust  health.  And 
this  need  is  shown  not  only  in  the  excessive 
number  of  doctors'  signs  and  drug  stores  and 
patent  medicine  advertisements  that  offend  the 
eye  on  all  sides,  but  still  more  in  the  faces  of 
our  compatriots.  In  these  faces  one  finds  genuine 
instances  of  happiness  and  peace,  the  benedic- 
tion of  those  who  have  found  good  fortune,  but 
one  also  finds  pictures  so  pitiably  sad  that  they 
haunt  one  like  so  many  spectres,  the  pinched 
faces  of  puny,  ill-nourished  children,  the  weary, 
desperate  faces  of  ill  and  overburdened  men  and 
women. 

To  declare  health  and  strength  to  be  an  essen- 
tial of  morality,  the  first  ingredient  of  good  for- 

161 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

tune,  is  one  thing.  To  attain  this  boon  is  an- 
other. For  many  of  us,  for  most  of  us  indeed, 
entire  bodily  soundness  is  out  of  the  question. 
We  start  the  race  handicapped  with  our  burden 
of  ancestral  wrong-doing,  our  inherited  ills.  We 
add  the  exposures  and  injuries  which  arise  from 
our  work,  from  making  a  living  in  a  community 
which  regards  the  theft  of  a  loaf  of  bread  as 
highly  reprehensible,  and  the  more  or  less  rapid 
sacrifice  of  a  life  to  industrial  exigencies  as  com- 
mendable faithfulness.  To  most  of  us  it  is  not 
given  to  satisfy  this  first  requirement  of  the  moral 
life,  —  the  requirement  of  strength.  To  that  ex- 
tent morality  condemns  us,  or  rather  forces  us  to 
condemn  ourselves.  It  may  seem  a  harsh  judg- 
ment, but  it  is  righteous.  If  one  be  not  strong, 
no  matter  what  the  cause  of  the  weakness,  one  is 
to  that  extent  deficient  in  virtue.  But  one  can  at 
least  be  honest.  The  personal  problem,  however, 
is  never  the  unattainable.  It  is  not  how  far  one 
would  go  if  one  had  seven-league  boots,  but  the 
humbler  problem  of  how  far  one  really  goes  in 
one's  present,  factory  made  shoes.  A  man  may 
properly  regret  the  strength  so  inevitably  denied, 
but  the  moral  life  demands  that  he  attain  such 
measure  of  strength  as  is  open  to  him.  And  this 
is  larger  than  most  of  us  suppose.  If  one  regard 
good  health  as  a  duty,  and  decline  to  sacrifice 
it  either  in  work  or  play,  its  increase  is  some- 

162 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


thing  quite  remarkable.  And  should  the  duty 
of  good  health  and  strength  pass  into  the  social 
consciousness,  and  be  made  to  cover  several  gen- 
erations, America  would  witness  the  birth  of  a 
new  race. 

The  problem  of  strength  is  individual.  The 
moral  man  must  look  himself  over  intelligently, 
and  this  frequently  means  through  more  skillful 
eyes  than  his  own,  the  eyes  of  trained  specialists, 
and  must  inquire  into  the  cause  and  remedy  of 
his  defects.  It  is  only  then  that  he  can  properly 
determine  diet,  residence,  occupation,  recreations. 
The  responsibility  for  these  things  is  commonly 
shifted  to  other  hands,  often  to  mere  chance. 
But  it  is  a  man's  own  personal  and  private  busi- 
ness to  look  into  these  life  conditions,  and  so  to 
rationalize  them  that  they  make  collectively  for 
strength.  It  would  be  beyond  the  proper  limits 
of  an  inquiry  into  morals  to  consider  the  vast 
body  of  detail  which  goes  to  make  up  the  phy- 
sical life;  but  that  part  of  it  which  concerns 
one's  own  temperament  must  be  effectively  studied 
by  each  seeker  after  good  fortune. 

We  are  justified  in  making  health  and  strength 
the  first  essentials  of  individual  morality  because 
they  are  ends  of  happiness  in  themselves,  and 
because  they  condition  most  completely  all  as- 
pects of  individual  activity.  But  for  precisely 
the  same  reasons,  health  and  strength  are  the 

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THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

first  essentials  of  social  welfare.  As  the  condi- 
tions of  happiness  they  are  the  conditions  of 
social  welfare.  A  whole  nation  of  sick  and  un- 
happy persons  can  never  achieve  welfare  for  the 
nation.  Each  sick  and  unhappy  man  makes  it 
less  possible,  for  social  welfare  is  distinctly  the 
sum  of  individual  good  fortune,  and  does  not 
differ  from  it  either  in  amount  or  kind.  Fur- 
thermore, the  power  of  achievement  for  the 
nation  at  large  rests  upon  the  strength  of  its 
individual  components,  and  can  never  exceed 
this.  Social  affairs  in  the  hands  of  invalids  suffer 
the  same  incompetent  treatment  that  do  indi- 
vidual affairs.  There  is  the  same  loss  in  morality, 
because  the  same  lowering  of  collective  efficiency, 
and  the  same  failure  to  grasp  the  full  ends  of 
good  fortune  and  welfare. 

In  the  matter  of  individual  strength,  both 
egoism  and  altruism  teach  the  same  thing ;  they 
teach  the  primal  duty  of  perfecting  it  to  the 
utmost.  The  man  so  socially  minded  as  to  look 
at  all  questions  from  the  point  of  view  of  welfare 
rather  than  of  individual  good  fortune  would 
do  in  this  respect  precisely  what  the  individual 
seeker  does.  He  must  set  to  work  to  make  him- 
self strong  and  well  in  order  that  he  may  serve 
the  more  effectively.  To  sacrifice  one's  self  is 
to  sacrifice  one's  cause.  The  man  who  breaks 
himself  down  in  any  service,  be  it  individual  or 

164 


INDIVIDUAL    MORALITY 


social,  reduces  both  the  quality  and  the  quantity 
of  his  usefulness,  and  is  to  that  extent  immoral. 
Society  is  not  best  served  by  human  wrecks  and 
fractions.  It  is  best  served  by  full-blooded, 
whole-hearted  men  and  women. 

To  be  beautiful  is  not  commonly  considered  a 
part  of  the  moral  life.  On  the  contrary,  personal 
beauty  is  usually  disparaged  us  something  rather 
incompatible  with  the  attainment  of  the  height 
of  morality.  The  homely  are  encouraged  to  con- 
tinue in  their  homeliness  by  the  news  that  beauty 
is  but  skin  deep.  Or  it  is  remarked  sententiously 
that  beauty  is  not  everything,  the  obvious  im- 
plication being  that  it  is  less  than  nothing,  —  a 
snare,  rather  than  a  source  of  legitimate  delight. 
The  majority  of  men  and  women  are  homely, 
—  physically,  mentally,  emotionally,  spiritually. 
It  is  a  part  of  the  poverty  of  a  people  given 
over  to  the  pursuit  of  things.  This  widespread 
dispraise  of  beauty  is  a  natural  result.  It  is  an 
impulse  of  self-justification.  The  majority  disre- 
gard human  wealth,  —  strength  and  beauty  and 
accomplishment  and  goodness,  —  and  make  suc- 
cess consist  in  less  personal  matters,  in  industrial 
combinations,  in  engineering  feats,  in  astound- 
ing statistics,  in  institutions,  laws,  big  crops, 
large  outputs,  —  in  a  word,  in  the  mechanics  of 
living,  rather  than  in  life  itself.  Those  who  sac- 
rifice strength  and  beauty  to  these  notoriously 

165 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

false  ends  are  very  prone  either  to  pride  them- 
selves on  the  sacrifice,  or  to  belittle  the  value  of 
what  they  have  thrown  away. 

Yet  we  admire  beauty  in  things,  in  scenery,  in 
architecture,  in  music,  in  literature,  in  the  fine 
arts.  We  admire  it  in  plants  and  animals.  We 
like  to  live  in  beautiful  houses,  and  surround 
ourselves  with  beautiful  objects.  We  Hke  to  have 
our  meals  served  from  beautiful  china,  and  to 
have  ourselves  and  our  friends  attired  in  beau- 
tiful clothing.  We  like  to  ride  beautiful  horses 
through  beautiful  parks.  We  travel  miles  to  see 
a  really  fine  picture  or  building,  and  put  our- 
selves to  no  end  of  discomfort  to  catch  a  glimpse 
of  some  natural  masterpiece.  In  all  our  ideal 
enterprises,  we  demand  beauty.  We  admire  it  in 
persons,  even  to  the  extent  of  worship,  but  we 
take  it  fortuitously,  not  as  a  thing  to  be  worked 
for  as  a  part*  of  the  real  good  of  life,  and  cer- 
tainly not  as  something  to  which  the  masses  may 
reasonably  aspire. 

But  there  is  a  moral  way  of  looking  at  beauty. 
It  is  good  in  and  for  itself,  a  source  of  whole- 
some pleasure  both  to  the  possessor  and  to  the  be- 
holder, a  part,  therefore,  of  both  individual  good 
fortune  and  of  social  welfare.  The  man  who  likes 
to  have  his  favorite  authors  in  strong  and  beauti- 
ful editions,  to  worship  in  temples  which  speak  of 
eternal  strength  and  beauty,  must  surely  wish 

166 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


his  own  spirit  no  less  suitably  housed.  He  would 
be  inconsistent  indeed  if  personal  ugliness  did 
not  distress  him,  and  personal  beauty  did  not 
bring  pleasure.  The  most  important  thing  in  the 
visible  creation  is  man,  and  if  he  fail  of  beauty, 
the  disaster  is  very  great.  Those  who  find  beauty 
in  their  own  faces  as  they  look  in  the  glass,  and 
strength  and  beauty  in  their  own  persons  as  they 
survey  them  from  head  to  foot,  have  attained 
some  measure  of  good  fortune,  and  they  were 
mean  spirited  indeed  if  they  counted  it  less  than 
its  value.  But  this  beauty  of  face  and  person 
gives  pleasure  because  it  is  the  mark  of  more  than 
superficial  excellence.  It  speaks  of  health  and 
strength  and  well-being.  And  the  term  beauty 
connotes  more  than  mere  regularity  of  feature  and 
form,  more  than  mere  anatomical  beauty.  The 
idea  of  beauty  depends  upon  the  spirit  of  the 
beholder,  only  somewhat  upon  the  object  itself. 
Personal  beauty,  to  the  noblest  natures,  includes 
not  only  the  strength  and  line  and  color  of  physi- 
cal perfection,  but  quite  as  essentially  the  intelli- 
gence of  an  informed  mind,  the  graciousness  of 
a  warm  and  sympathetic  heart,  the  spiritual  charm 
of  a  soul  which  has  come  into  reverent  relation 
with  the  unseen.  To  be  beautiful  in  this  inclu- 
sive way  is  indeed  to  satisfy  the  full  law  of  in- 
dividual morality.  It  involves  strength,  it  ex- 
presses charm,  it  necessitates  accomplishment,  it 

167 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

radiates  goodness.  This  is  the  gracious  person, 
the  one  who  bears  the  very  stamp  of  excellence, 
whose  worth  lies  not  in  the  past,  not  in  the  fu- 
ture, not  in  what  he  has  done,  not  in  what  he 
means  to  do,  but  in  what  he  is,  and  what  he 
does,  in  the  immediate  present. 

We  require  this  thoroughness  of  beauty  in  the 
things  which  we  admire,  this  genuineness.  Rhine- 
stones are  less  valued  than  diamonds,  because 
from  these  man-mixed  silicates  we  cannot  get  the 
sparkle  and  brilliancy  of  the  elemental  carbon. 
Scagliola-work  does  not  pass  for  marble,  or  a  glass 
ball  for  rock-crystal,  among  persons  who  know, 
and  the  refusal  is  not  on  the  bare  ground  that 
they  are  imitations,  but  on  the  truer  ground  that 
they  fail  to  reproduce  the  beauty  of  the  things 
imitated.  We  require  the  same  thoroughness  in 
the  beauty  of  plant  and  animal ;  not  alone  the 
grace  of  branch  and  leaf,  blossom  and  fruit,  the 
outer  virtues,  but  as  well  the  subtler  excellence  of 
fibre,  odor,  and  taste ;  not  alone  the  color  and 
line  of  blooded  stock,  but  the  sparkle  and  quiver 
that  indicate  speed  and  endurance  and  faithful- 
ness. We  are  justified  in  using  the  term  beauty 
in  this  same  inclusive  way  when  we  seek  to  apply 
it  to  the  most  excellent  of  earth  objects,  to  per- 
sons. The  thoroughbred  alone  is  beautiful.  To 
be  beautiful  humanly  is  to  have  this  excellence 
of  the  entire  person,  this  beauty  of  mind  and 

168 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


heart  and  spirit,  as  well  as  the  beauty  of  form 
and  color. 

As  we  have  said,  the  standard  of  beauty  is  not 
determined  by  the  object,  but  by  the  beholder. 
Strictly  speaking,  the  lover  of  excellence  does  not 
know  such  a  thing  as  mere  anatomical  beauty. 
To  him  it  would  be  regularity  of  feature,  nicety 
of  coloring,  but  it  would  not  be  beauty.  It  is  no 
sophistry  to  say  that  the  major  content  of  human 
beauty  is  spiritual,  is  the  inner  fire  and  spirit  that 
shine  out  through  the  face  and  person,  and  pro- 
claim the  worth  of  the  individual  as  a  whole.  So 
the  faces  of  the  aged,  when  they  speak  of  peace 
and  serenity;  the  faces  of  ^ plain'  men  and 
women,  when  they  are  touched  by  good-will  and 
intelligence;  the  faces  of  freckled,  snub-nosed 
children,  when  they  are  alert  with  interest  and 
comradeship,  possess  this  radiant  beauty  quite  as 
much  as  does  the  Apollo  of  the  Vatican. 

To  be  beautiful  in  this  thoroughgoing  fashion 
is  an  essential  part  of  human  worth,  and  the  striv- 
ing to  be  beautiful  is  a  necessary  part  of  moral 
aspiration.  One  must  accept  the  larger  features 
of  one's  person  as  heredity  imposes,  but  by  exer- 
cise and  healthful  living  one  may  improve  the 
heritage,  may  make  the  very  most  of  it,  even  if 
it  be  one  poor  talent  only,  and  may  at  least  be 
less  unbeautiful  than  if  one  had  not  tried.  In 
spite  of  his  many  masks,  man  is  a  unit,  and  the 

169 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

mind  and  heart  and  spirit  in  him  have  as  specific 
features  as  has  his  outer  person.  But  apparently 
they  are  more  flexible,  and  by  exercise  and  health- 
ful living  they  too  may  be  brought  into  greater 
comeliness.  To  make  the  mind  supple  and  in- 
formed, to  make  the  heart  sympathetic  and 
human,  to  make  the  spirit  reverent  and  intuitive, 
—  these  tasks  present  serious  material  for  a  life- 
time of  effort  and  happiness.  It  is  an  individual 
task,  the  self-imposed  culture  which  covers  the 
whole  of  life,  the  control  of  one's  own  conduct. 
It  is  the  quest  of  good  fortune  in  the  most  per- 
sonal and  individual  fashion.  It  is  a  high  plea- 
sure even  to  essay  this  genuine  beauty.  To  possess 
it  would  be  a  consolation  in  the  desert  or  quite 
alone  in  the  wilderness.  The  feeling  is  not  one 
of  vanity,  or  complacency,  or  self-love.  It  is  the 
exaltation  which  is  inseparable  from  the  high  en- 
deavor that  one  knows  to  be  one's  best,  and  worth 
while.  There  is  indeed  something  of  ecstasy  in 
it,  the  feeling  that  Sir  Galahad  had  when  he  went 
in  search  of  the  Holy  Grail,  the  emotion  of  the 
mystic  when  it  sweeps  over  him  that  in  very  truth 
he  is  the  friend  of  God. 

This  search  for  absolute  beauty,  not  in  the 
abstract,  but  as  incarnated  in  one's  self,  is  in 
reality  the  study  and  pursuit  of  perfection,  what 
Arnold  properly  calls  culture,  and  is  the  all- 
inclusive  duty  of  the  individual,  as  it  is  the  most 

170 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


inclusive  guise  of  his  personal  good  fortune.  But 
while  the  tests  are  individual  and  the  most  im- 
mediate results  are  individual,  the  influence  and 
service  are  no  less  social.  This  is  so  altogether 
obvious  that  one  might  hardly  be  excused  for 
dwelling  upon  it,  and  dwelling  upon  it  so  persist- 
ently, if  it  were  not  that  the  study  and  pursuit 
of  perfection,  the  putting  of  culture  before  every 
other  end,  is  commonly  represented  as  a  proceed- 
ing so  shamelessly  selfish  as  to  have  nothing  in 
common  with  morality,  and  much  in  common  with 
its  opposite.  The  contrary  ideal  is  constantly 
held  up  for  approval,  the  touching  if  not  alto- 
gether practical  ideal  of  poverty-stricken  souls 
with  nothing  to  give  to  society  generously  giv- 
ing their  all !  But  personal  beauty,  like  personal 
strength,  while  it  would  be  eminently  worth 
while,  even  if  one  stood  quite  alone,  the  very  last 
man  in  creation,  finds  an  infinitely  more  fruitful 
soil  both  for  its  exercise  and  culture  in  the  human 
relations  which  constitute  the  helpful  and  accept- 
able interplay  in  our  actual  world  of  men  and 
women  and  children.  Man  does  not  stand  alone, 
is  not  the  last  of  his  kind,  and  spends  but  a  tiny 
fraction  of  the  waking  day  apart  from  his  fellows. 
He  is  a  social  animal  both  by  nature  and  neces- 
sity. His  beauty  is  therefore  a  social  possession, 
as  much  a  component  of  welfare  as  of  good  for- 
tune.   To  be  appreciated,  it  must  be  seen  ;  and  no 

171 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

generous  and  sensitive  man  can  see  strength  and 
beauty  in  his  fellows  without  a  distinct  sense  of 
pleasure.  The  informed  mind  must  spend  itself 
on  human  tasks,  the  tasks  of  the  many.  The 
sympathetic  heart  is  the  basis  of  good-fellowship. 
Even  the  reverent  spirit,  which  seems  to  concern 
only  the  individual  and  the  unseen,  is  reflected 
in  a  man's  attitude  towards  all  problems,  touches 
all  persons  whom  he  touches,  and  becomes  the 
encourager  of  reverence  in  others. 

In  making  beauty  so  all-inclusive  a  part  of  in- 
dividual morality,  there  would  seem  small  room 
for  the  mention  of  accomplishment,  yet  accom- 
plishment deserves  separate  mention,  for  it  is  the 
necessary  product  of  strength  of  body  and  beauty 
of  spirit.  Accomplishment  is  human  performance 
of  a  worthy  kind,  the  doing  of  something  that 
adds  to  the  pleasure  and  delight  of  mankind.  It 
is  eminently  individual  in  the  doing,  eminently 
social  in  the  fruition.  Performance  in  general, 
in  this  material,  spiritual  world  of  ours,  involves 
both  ideas  and  objects,  and  when  the  perform- 
ance is  human,  it  requires  the  motive  power  and 
the  knowledge  which  make  up  so  large  a  part  of 
beauty,  and  the  trained  organs  of  the  body,  — 
eye  and  ear  and  voice  and  hand,  —  which  make 
up  so  large  a  part  of  strength.  The  artist  is  the 
man  of  this  superior  endowment,  and  his  works 
stand  to  future  generations  as  the  measure  of  our 

172 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


civilization.  He  requires  the  inner  eye  of  the 
beautiful  spirit  to  conceive  his  work,  the  trained 
members  of  the  strong,  efficient  body  to  execute 
it.  Accomplishment  is  a  part  of  human  wealth, 
and  therefore  a  part  of  morality.  It  is  not  at  all 
the  superficiality  which  men  of  business  suppose 
it  to  be,  the  sort  of  thing  to  bid  for  women's 
praise,  but  a  part  of  the  integrity  of  fife,  of  the 
full  measure  of  excellence  which  differentiates 
the  moral  man  from  the  immoral  man.  It  is  not 
a  matter  of  moral  indifference  whether  we  neg- 
lect this  human  accomplishment,  this  training 
of  a  strong  and  vital  organism,  and  take  to 
bookkeeping  and  commercial  ventures.  In  the 
giving  up  of  higher  ends  for  lower  ends,  no 
amount  of  efficiency  can  compensate  for  the  loss 
of  worth. 

Men  have  so  much  in  common  outwardly,  and 
so  genuine  a  touch  of  brotherhood,  that  we  are 
prone  to  forget  how  different  in  degree,  how 
almost  different  in  kind,  are  the  several  types 
of  man  that  go  to  make  up  humanity.  But  man  is 
just  the  sum  of  his  faculties  and  qualities.  It  is 
this  sum  which  makes  his  virtue  or  his  vice,  his 
wealth  or  his  poverty.  While  his  very  charm,  as 
we  have  been  insisting  all  along,  depends  upon 
variety,  upon  the  unique  summation  of  qual- 
ities which  each  individual  presents,  it  is  true 
that  only  those  combinations  which  can  truth- 

173 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

fully  be  said  to  include  strength  and  beauty  and 
accomplishment  and  goodness  can  be  classed  as 
moral.  In  the  more  primitive  and  unreflecting 
man,  virtue  is  fortuitous,  something  he  happens 
to  have  or  not  to  have.  But  our  present  man, 
the  heir  of  all  the  ages,  knows  in  what  virtue 
consists,  that  it  consists  in  this  perfecting  of  his 
nature  in  the  most  genuine  and  thoroughgoing 
fashion  possible,  and  it  is  this  knowledge  which 
makes  him  responsible. 

The  particular  obligation  of  being  accom- 
plished rests  not  only  upon  the  fact  that  accom- 
plishment is  an  end  in  itself,  a  source  of  happiness 
both  to  the  accomplished  person  himself  and  to 
those  who  see  or  hear  his  accomplishments,  but 
also  upon  the  very  far-reaching  fact,  too  little 
considered  in  our  own  day  and  generation,  that 
the  accompHshed  personality  opens  the  door  to 
that  wider  knowledge  and  deeper  insight  upon 
which  human  beauty  so  largely  depends,  the 
beauty  of  mind  and  heart  and  spirit.  It  is  not 
a  matter  of  indifference  as  to  whether  one  has 
the  seeing  eyes  and  hearing  ear,  and  cultivated 
voice  and  trained  and  discriminating  nose  and 
tongue.  These  organs  are  the  soul's  ambassadors 
in  the  great  outer  world  of  matter  and  motion, 
the  reporters  who  furnish  the  material  out  of 
which  the  individual  panorama  of  life  is  to  be 
built.    If  they  fail  to  report  fully  and  truly,  to 

174 


INDIVIDUAL    MORALITY 


report  things  as  they  are,  the  world  which  each 
man  is  thus  forced  to  create  for  himself  through 
his  own  activity  is  a  partial,  even  a  false  world, 
in  which  the  true  relation  of  things  is  never 
perceived,  and  knowledge  —  the  perception  of 
relations  —  is  rendered  impossible.  So  when  a 
man  neglects  the  health  and  training  of  his  facul- 
ties, for  business,  for  more  immediate  pleasure, 
or  for  whatsoever  end,  he  deliberately  makes  this 
larger  world  and  larger  knowledge  impossible, 
and  condemns  himself  to  something  distinctly  less 
than  the  best,  to  a  more  limited  experience. 
How  truly  tragic  this  curtailment  is  can  be  seen 
only  too  vividly  when  such  a  partialist  is  called 
upon  to  meet  either  leisure  or  old  age.  The 
petty  business  to  which  he  gave  his  manhood  is 
gone,  and  there  remains  only  the  unfurnished 
house.  One  meets  the  tragedy  in  every  village 
which  boasts  its  retired  men  of  business,  in  every 
corner  of  Europe  where  the  unenlightened  seek 
to  enjoy  what  they  call  success.  The  failure  to 
become  accomplished  means  a  failure  to  come 
into  the  largest  fulfillment  of  the  self,  the  great- 
est happiness,  and  must  be  accounted  an  essential 
immorality.    It  was  Socrates  who  said :  — 

^  The  best  man  is  he  who  most  tries  to  perfect 
himself,  and  the  happiest  man  is  he  who  most 
feels  that  he  is  perfecting  himself.' 

And  Arnold  may  be  further  quoted  when  he 
175 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

writesj  '  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt,  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  souls  that  have  ever  existed,  used  to  say 
that  one's  business  in  life  was,  first,  to  perfect 
one's  self  by  all  the  means  in  one's  power,  and 
secondly,  to  try  and  create  in  the  world  around 
one  an  aristocracy,  the  most  numerous  that  one 
possibly  could,  of  talents  and  character.' 

To  be  strong  and  beautiful  and  accompHshed 
and  good  seems  to  me  the  full  formula  of  indi- 
vidual morality,  a  formula  which  has  in  it  the  vi- 
tality of  infinite  promise ;  for  strength  and  beauty 
and  accomplishment  and  goodness  are  not  shallow 
springs  to  be  drunk  dry  in  the  hot  summer  of 
a  single  lifetime,  but  rather  unfailing  wells  of 
ceaseless  effort  and  attainment.  Nor  is  the  order 
accidental.  In  one  sense,  to  be  beautiful  includes 
everything,  the  idealization  of  one's  relations  to 
one's  self,  to  the  neighbor,  and  to  God.  But  it 
gains  in  impressiveness  to  have  on  the  one  side 
strength  and  on  the  other  accomplishment.  When 
one  is  all  this,  one  is  in  the  truest  sense  good,  for 
one  has  satisfied  the  moral  law,  has  manifested 
efficiency  and  the  worth  which  means  individual 
good  fortune  and  social  welfare.  To  be  good  is 
the  general  aim,  of  which  strength  and  beauty 
and  accomplishment  are  the  special  terms.  It  is 
properly  mentioned  last  both  because  it  deserves 
the  emphasis  of  such  position,  and  because  it  is 
the  result,  the  summing  up,  of  all  those  efforts 

176 


INDIVIDUAL   MORALITY 


after  perfection  which  constitute  culture,  the  af- 
firmation of  the  larger  self. 

But  we  must  pass  now  to  the  more  special 
aspects  of  the  quest,  and  to  the  psychological 
method  by  which  morality  is  attained. 


IX 

THE  CARDINAL  VIRTUES 

THE  Cardinal  Virtues  of  the  ancient  world,  at 
least  as  far  back  as  Aristotle,  were  Justice, 
Prudence,  Temperance,  and  Fortitude.  Human 
virtue  turned  upon  these  as  upon  a  pivot.  The 
Roman  church  retains  these  virtues  unaltered, 
though  it  changes  the  order,  making  the  sequence 
run  Prudence,  Fortitude,  Temperance,  and  Jus- 
tice, a  change  significant  of  the  different  outlook 
between  the  ancient  and  the  modern  world,  the 
change  of  emphasis  from  state  duty  to  individ- 
ual duty.  To  antiquity,  individual  virtues  like 
prudence,  temperance,  and  fortitude  apparently 
flowed  out  of  the  civic  virtue  of  justice.  To  a 
later  world,  cause  and  effect  are  reversed,  and 
social  righteousness  comes  as  the  flower  of  per- 
sonal virtue.  The  minor  morals  are  supposed  to 
flow  out  of  the  cardinal  virtues,  and  to  be  distinct 
from  the  three  great  theological  virtues,  Faith, 
Hope,  and  Charity,  the  greatest  of  which  we 
are  all  supposed  to  know,  whether  or  not  we  prac- 
tice it. 

These  seven  most  august  of  virtues  make  an 
impressive  series.    The  life  which  could  exemplify 

178 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


them  all  would  indeed  reach  a  high  order  of  ex- 
cellence. Our  modern  man,  seeking  good  fortune, 
would  not  wish  to  neglect  one  of  them.  But  as 
a  matter  of  daily  method  he  shows  a  diminishing 
esteem  for  all  these  hard-and-fast  distinctions. 
In  attempting  to  make  conduct  square  with  these 
seven  virtues,  and  do  full  justice  to  all  of  them, 
it  soon  becomes  evident,  not  that  they  are  in  any 
way  antagonistic,  but  rather  that  in  many  cases 
they  so  far  overlap  as  to  become  distinctions  with- 
out a  difference,  and  that  in  all  cases  they  are 
such  vague  terms,  and  open  to  such  varying  in- 
terpretation, that  one  can  read  into  them  either  a 
narrow  duty  or  a  whole  system  of  morals.  This 
is  especially  true  of  the  first  and  last  of  the  vir- 
tues. Justice  and  Charity.  Justice,  in  this  latitu- 
dinarian  sense,  means  everything,  not  only  strict 
obedience  to  the  clear  letter  of  the  law,  which  it 
is  commonly  limited  to  mean,  but  also  an  equally 
punctilious  regard  for  all  the  requirements  im- 
posed by  the  larger  self,  for  all  sides  of  the  de- 
veloped human  nature,  generosity,  consideration, 
and  mercy,  as  well  as  the  harsher  virtues.  To  say 
of  any  one,  '  He  was  a  just  man,'  is  to  accord 
the  highest  praise,  if  by  this  one  means  that  he 
satisfied  all  the  demands  of  his  own  rich  na- 
ture, for  the  larger  content  of  justice  is  personal 
and  subjective.  So  inclusive  is  the  term  that  it 
might  properly  be  used  as  synonymous  with  good 

179 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

fortune,  as  the  thing  which  the  heart  desires  when 
the  heart  is  informed.  In  a  similar  way,  charity, 
and  especially  when  it  represents  good-will  or  love, 
is  the  full  measure  of  the  law  of  human  life. 

This  flexibility  of  all  but  the  most  technical 
terms,  this  perplexing  fluidity  of  language,  is 
highly  inconvenient  if  one  wish  to  be  a  system- 
maker.  It  is  indeed  warmly  resented  by  moralists 
of  the  pigeon-hole  order  as  an  unfair  advantage 
on  the  part  of  those  who  decline  to  see  life  in 
compartments.  It  is  persistently  regarded  as  a 
dodging  of  the  issues,  when  in  reality  it  is  simply 
a  proper  refusal  to  discuss  issues  until  they  have 
been  sufficiently  defined  to  make  the  discussion 
profitable.  The  newer  moralists,  with  their  more 
flexible  view  of  things,  are  a  natural  product  of 
the  newer  psychology.  It  is  no  longer  possible  to 
regard  human  life  as  made  up  of  so  many  sepa- 
rate sensations,  thoughts,  impressions,  impulses, 
to  ticket  off  human  qualities  with  capital  letters, 
and  count  the  analysis  complete.  The  older  psy- 
chology had  this  defect,  it  made  life  excessively 
granular,  and  ended  by  making  it  altogether 
incoherent,  something  that  would  not  at  all  hold 
together.  But  psychology  of  late  has  come  back 
from  these  unprofitable  excursions  into  specula- 
tion, and  is  turning  increasingly  to  experience 
for  its  proper  data.  And  experience  shows  man 
to  be,  not  a  bundle  of  unrelated  qifalities,  but  a 

180 


THE   CARDINAL  VIRTUES 


unit  stream  of  consciousness.  Life  is  flexible  and 
fluid.  One  mood  flows  into  a  second,  and  this 
into  a  third.  One  set  of  interests  shifts  and 
another  takes  its  place.  The  emphasis  is  forever 
changing,  but  life  does  not  consist  in  the  state 
that  is  past  or  in  the  state  that  is  to  come;  it 
consists  in  just  the  movement  by  which  the  fu- 
ture becomes  the  present,  and  the  present  becomes 
the  past.  So  human  hf  e,  as  an  experience,  is  best 
figured  under  this  simile  of  a  stream.  Modern 
psychology  regards  the  mental  life  as  a  unit 
consciousness,  essentially  coherent  and  integral. 
Modern  morality  is  necessarily  psychological, 
and  it  shares  this  view  of  the  unity  and  indivisi- 
bility of  the  thinking  life.  Morality  is  a  fabric, 
of  which  the  warp  is  efficiency  and  the  woof  is 
worth,  but  it  is  an  integral  fabric,  never  perfect, 
perhaps,  but  never  wholly  deficient,  woven  out  of 
that  continuous,  varied,  but  essentially  unit  mate- 
rial, human  conduct.  The  best  conduct  would 
include  the  cardinal  virtues  and  all  the  minor 
morals  that  flow  out  of  them,  but  it  is  not  made 
up  of  these  as  so  many  ingredients,  in  definite 
and  prescribed  proportions.  It  is  rather  the 
visible  expression  of  that  stream  of  conscious- 
ness which  represents  individual  existence,  and  is 
characterized  by  the  same  essential  unity.  It  is 
more  scientific  and  psychological  to  picture  mo- 
rahty  as  a  definite  attitude  towards  the  problems 

181 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

of  life,  a  tendency  in  thought  and  action  which 
gives  worth  and  efficiency  to  the  Hfe  as  a  whole. 
One  who  holds  this  view  of  morality,  both 
towards  himself  and  towards  others,  is  not  too 
deeply  offended  by  small  defects,  or  unduly  im- 
pressed by  capricious  and  extravagant  virtues. 
The  thing  that  counts  is  the  man's  general  atti- 
tude towards  life,  and  the  certainty  with  which 
he  expresses  this  attitude  in  action.  If  on  the 
whole  this  attitude  makes  for  good  fortune  and 
welfare,  the  man  is  a  moral  man.  If  it  makes 
increasingly  for  good,  he  is  a  growing  man.  But 
if  the  tendency  of  his  Hfe  has  not  this  upward 
trend,  no  meteoric  virtues,  cardinal  or  minor,  can 
make  the  life  other  than  a  failure. 

Morality  is  of  one  piece.  This  is  at  the  bottom 
of  that  astonishing  statement  of  Jesus  to  the 
effect  that  he  that  is  guilty  of  breaking  one  of 
the  divine  commandments  is  guilty  of  breaking 
them  all.  Men  are  not  saints  and  sinners  either 
alternately  or  in  sections.  They  are  what  they 
are,  individual  manifestations  of  consciousness, 
and  are  sound  or  unsound  according  to  its  char- 
acter. Human  conduct  expresses  this  conscious- 
ness, is  indeed  the  data  from  which  we  are  able 
at  all  to  reason  back  to  the  consciousness,  and  it 
possesses  the  same  soundness  or  unsoundness. 

We  have  said  that  religion  is  a  man's  attitude 
towards  life,  towards  the  seen  and  the  unseen. 

182 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


It  is  a  good  religion  when  the  attitude  is  good. 
It  is  a  bad  religion  when  the  attitude  is  bad. 
But  no  man  is  without  a  religion  of  some  sort, 
for  no  man  can  be  devoid  of  a  characteristic 
and  recognizable  attitude  towards  life.  As  the 
good  attitude  expresses  itself  in  moral  conduct, 
we  may  say  that  morality  in  action  is  true  reli- 
gion. Salvation,  as  a  practical  operation,  means 
just  this  attainment,  maintenance,  and  deepen- 
ing of  the  good  attitude.  In  the  nature  of 
things,  salvation  cannot  come  suddenly  or  com- 
pletely. One  cannot  pass  from  the  state  of  not 
being  saved  one  day  to  the  state  of  being  saved 
the  next  day.  Salvation  is  a  matter  of  degree, 
a  work  never  wholly  without  beginning,  and 
never  wholly  at  an  end.  It  is  true  that  it  pro- 
ceeds at  unequal  rates.  Professor  James  has 
shown  that  the  phenomenon  of  conversion  is  a 
genuine  psychological  event.  Compared  to  the 
ordinary  processes  of  life,  it  is  cataclysmic  in  its 
action,  a  violent  shifting  of  the  centre  of  con- 
sciousness. All  the  facts  of  life  remain  the  same, 
but  some  new  fact  is  now  added  which  suddenly 
alters  the  significance  of  things.  The  conscious- 
ness is  so  far  changed  that  we  have  apparently 
to  deal  with  a  new  and  different  man.  Persons 
who  have  experienced  this  dramatic  rebirth  are 
aptly  termed  the  '  twice-born.'  The  value  of  the 
experience  depends  not  alone  upon  what  atti- 

183 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

tude  it  leads  out  of,  but  still  more  upon  what 
attitude  it  leads  into.  No  disaster  can  be  more 
complete  morally  and  spiritually  than  to  be  twice 
born  and  to  stop  there.  Life  is  not  so  slender 
a  possession  that  any  shifting  of  the  centre  of 
consciousness,  however  violent,  can  exhaust  its 
potentialities.  Conversion  may  be  the  beginning 
of  a  series  of  wholesome  and  remarkable  changes 
in  a  man's  attitude  towards  life,  as  it  was  in  the 
case  of  Paul,  and  has  been  in  the  case  of  multi- 
tudes of  less  distinguished  converts.  But  the 
danger  of  conversion  in  less  resourceful  natures 
lies  in  its  tendency  to  produce  a  final  and  static 
attitude,  a  complacency  which  regards  the  work 
of  salvation  as  completed.  In  nearly  all  instances 
a  failure  to  advance  does  not  mean  a  safe  stand- 
ing still,  but  a  decided  retrogression.  The  his- 
tory of  conversions  illustrates  this  tendency. 

Those  persons  who  by  reason  of  tempera- 
ment or  circumstance  have  failed  to  experience 
conversion  have  been  termed  by  contrast  the 
'  once-born.'  They  represent  the  more  usual,  and 
it  seems  to  me  the  more  wholesome  process 
of  morality.  In  reahty,  they  have  not  been  born 
twice,  but  many  times,  born  anew  each  day,  each 
hour,  as  consciousness  becomes  a  larger,  stronger, 
clearer  stream,  and  the  resultant  attitude  towards 
life  a  more  intelligent,  more  efficient,  and  more 
worthy  attitude.    It  is  certainly  noteworthy  that 

184 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


conversion  is  much  more  common  among  the 
ignorant  masses,  and  is  the  chosen  method  of 
propaganda  of  those  evangelists  who  devote 
themselves  to  the  masses.  I  have  just  read  that 
that  excellent  man,  General  Booth,  made  seventy- 
one  conversions  during  his  two  days'  stay  in  Bos- 
ton, and  he  is  reported  to  have  worked  very  hard 
for  them.  One  cannot  but  hope  that  the  illu- 
mination thus  reported  was  a  true  inner  light 
that  may  remain  and  grow  increasingly  brighter. 
And  yet  one  must  feel  that  morality,  like  geo- 
logy, does  not  make  its  real  advances  through 
this  cataclysmic  action,  but  rather  through  the 
continuous  action  of  the  gentler  forces  of  nature, 
the  line  upon  line  and  precept  upon  precept  by 
which  the  intelligent  moral  seeker  after  good  for- 
tune becomes  more  intelligent  and  more  moral, 
and  so  progresses  in  his  quest. 

It  is  also  noticeable  that  culture,  by  the  very 
continuousness  and  genuineness  of  its  own  study 
and  pursuit  of  perfection,  makes  conversion  psy- 
chologically less  possible,  and  even  in  a  sense 
undesirable.  The  spirit  has  its  feast-days  and  fast- 
days,  its  ecstasies  and  depressions,  its  plenty  and 
its  drought,  but  the  unfolding  of  the  larger  self, 
the  attainment  of  the  larger  life,  goes  steadily 
forward  by  a  series  of  constant  rebirths  and  re- 
adjustments. To  the  twice-born  this  less  noisy 
pursuit  of  righteousness,  this  '  religion  of  cul- 

185 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

ture/  as  it  is  called  sometimes  in  admiration  and 
sometimes  in  derision,  may  appear  on  the  whole 
not  so  genuine  and  whole-souled  as  the  more 
dramatic  regeneration,  but  the  final  test  of  either 
movement  must  be  its  fruits,  and  by  this  the 
moralist  shall  know  them.  It  is  a  question  of 
temperament,  and  as  such  almost  as  little  open 
to  discussion  as  taste.  Neither  temperament  may 
condemn  the  method  of  the  other,  —  provided 
the  results  are  good.  But  morality,  founded 
upon  intelligence  and  knowledge,  must  regard 
as  the  saner  and  more  rational  process  that  grad- 
ual and  continuous  change  of  attitude  which 
marks  the  normal  evolutipn  of  a  human  soul. 

In  our  practical  judgments  of  men,  it  is  the 
general  attitude  that  we  really  take  into  the  most 
serious  consideration.  Habitual  wrong-doing  in- 
dicates an  unsocial  and  immoral  attitude  towards 
life,  just  as  habitual  right-doing  bespeaks  the 
good  attitude.  So  marked  is  the  popular  empha- 
sis upon  this  general  attitude  that  when  even 
moderately  good,  it  receives  the  stamp  of  a  social 
approval  which  is  either  denied  altogether,  or 
bestowed  most  grudgingly,  in  the  case  of  the 
mechanical  and  narrow-minded  pursuit  of  some 
particular  virtue  or  set  of  virtues.  We  even  hear 
the  dispraise  of  perfection,  and  odd-sounding 
chants  to  the  glory  of  the  imperfect.  In  reality, 
what  is  thus  praised  is  the  open-mindedness  and 

186 


THE   CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


flexibility  which  promise  in  the  end  a  far  larger 
morahty,  a  far  greater  measure  of  perfection, 
than  can  be  attained  by  the  mechanical  follow- 
ing of  conventional  methods.  It  is  a  somewhat 
common  experience  to  meet  persons  of  careless 
conduct,  persons  who  do  things  which  we  our- 
selves should  be  quite  unwilling  to  do,  or  to 
commend,  but  who  yet  seem  toi  us,  even  in  our 
most  judicial  moods,  to  possess  a  larger  and  more 
cosmic  morality  than  we  have  personally  man- 
aged to  compass.  There  is  in  this  open-air,  full- 
blooded  morality  of  the  world  something  infinitely 
more  robust  and  endearing  than  can  be  found  in 
the  fragile  morality  of  the  cloister.  Part  of  the 
charm  is  in  its  very  human  charity,  the  divine 
gift  whose  absence  sometimes  keeps  the  children 
of  the  kingdom  out  of  the  kingdom,  and  whose 
presence  sometimes  brings  in  the  publicans  and 
sinners. 

But  the  real  greatness  of  this  world-moral- 
ity lies  in  its  dimensions,  in  the  amount  of  human 
intercourse  that  has  been  fairly  idealized.  The 
more  one  sees  of  the  world,  the  more  one  is  dis- 
posed to  award  the  palm  of  virtue,  not  to  the 
provincialist,  pursuing  a  narrow  round  of  narrow 
duties,  not  to  the  partialist,  neglecting  most 
shamefully  the  other  content  of  life  in  his  devo- 
tion to  some  one  specific  duty,  but  to  that  larger 
person,  the  man  of  experience,  who  is  ungrudg- 

187 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

ingly  meeting  the  world  without  fear  and  with- 
out reproach,  and  is  developing,  as  naturally  as 
the  blade  the  full-grown  ear,  that  generous  and 
moral  attitude  toward  life  which  makes  for  the 
fullest  measure  of  good  fortune  and  welfare. 

The  danger  in  following  any  formula  too  ex- 
clusively, like  the  danger  in  conversion,  is  that 
one  will  stop  there.  There  are  many  virtues, 
cardinal  and  other,  which  the  world  cannot  at 
all  do  without  and  remain  human  and  social,  but 
which  lead  to  moral  disaster  and  wretchedness 
when  pursued  in  this  unintelligent  fashion,  as 
ends  in  themselves  and  quite  out  of  relation  to 
the  whole  of  life.  The  man  who  elects  a  particu- 
lar virtue  for  his  very  own,  or  even  a  particular 
set  of  virtues,  and  sticks  to  them  through  thick 
and  thin,  is  prone  to  develop  a  curiously  vicious 
stubbornness  which  may  lead  him  to  neglect  far 
weightier  matters  of  the  law,  and  may  even  end 
by  wrecking  his  own  life  and  the  lives  of  those 
intimately  associated  with  his.  The  history  of 
Puritanism  is  full  of  these  tragedies,  and  their 
shadows  still  hang  over  New  England  life.  It 
has  been  said,  not  inaptly,  that  vice  has  this  ad- 
vantage over  virtue,  that  it  is  at  least  restrained 
by  conscience. 

While  the  unintelligent  pursuit  of  single  vir- 
tues is  fraught  with  grave  individual  dangers, 
it  is  no  less  disadvantageous  socially.    It  tends 

188 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


to  bring  into  discredit  the  virtues  themselves,  — 
another  ease  of  being  murdered  in  the  house  of 
one's  friends.  In  extreme  cases,  one  is  almost 
driven  over  to  the  opposite  vices.  Pedantry  makes 
ignorance  seem  fairly  lovable.  Meanness  turns 
extravagance  into  a  virtue.  Prudishness  trans- 
forms carelessness  into  something  of  a  merit. 
The  corrective  of  all  this  blindness  is  the  rea- 
sonable perspective  which  assigns  to  each  moral 
function,  each  cardinal  virtue,  its  proper  and  sub- 
ordinate place,  and  provides  against  our  faiHng 
to  see  the  forest  for  the  trees. 

After  so  large  a  disclaimer  against  moral  taHs- 
mans,  it  will  be  perfectly  safe,  I  hope,  to  point 
out  that  there  are  nevertheless  certain  very  spe- 
cific virtues  which,  when  pursued  broadly  and 
intelligently,  go  to  make  up  the  very  substance 
of  the  good  attitude.  The  individual  must  show 
certain  definite  qualities,  strength  and  beauty 
and  accomplishment,  —  the  sum  of  which  is  good- 
ness, —  or  he  fails  of  morality.  And  we  have 
seen  that  any  one  of  these  qualities,  and  espe- 
cially beauty,  if  interpreted  broadly  and  flexi- 
bly enough,  represents  the  full  letter  and  spirit 
of  the  law,  —  a  result  not  due  to  any  stretching 
of  language,  but  due  solely  to  the  monistic  con- 
stitution of  man  himself,  to  the  fact  that  he  is  a 
unit  consciousness.  And  we  have  seen  that  the 
virtues  which   have  sufficient  catholicity  to  be 

189 


OF  THE      ^ 

UNIVERSITY 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

called  cardinal  have  the  same  inclusiveness. 
They,  too,  present  the  same  integrity  of  con- 
sciousness, since,  interpreted  broadly  and  flexibly 
enough,  they  are  all-sufficient.  From  our  own 
point  of  view,  which  makes  the  highest  good 
reside  in  a  personal  good  fortune  pursued  so 
intelligently  as  to  lead  to  social  welfare,  the  car- 
dinal virtues  are  essentially  individualistic.  They 
bear  many  honored  names,  —  truth,  honesty, 
courage,  temperance,  chastity,  hope,  reverence, 
love,  —  but  they  are  all  aspects  of  the  one 
supreme  cardinal  virtue,  —  Knowledge.  Such 
experiments  in  goodness  as  the  world  has  so 
far  made,  feeble  and  inconclusive  as  they  are, 
warrant  the  far-reaching  generalization  that  if 
we  were  infinitely  wise,  we  should  biB  infinitely 
good.  The  path  to  this  supreme  goodness  must 
be  the  path  to  such  supreme  knowledge. 

The  cardinal  virtue  in  the  good  attitude  must 
be  just  this  practical,  unquenchable  desire  to 
know  things  as  they  are,  —  the  centuries-old 
search  for  the  truth,  to  know  it  and  to  live  it. 
Along  with  the  dispraise  of  culture  one  hears 
also  the  dispraise  of  what  is  denominated  '  mere 
knowledge,'  and  many  other  things  are  rated 
much  more  highly.  But  this  disparagement  of 
knowledge  comes  either  from  its  enemies,  who 
are  not  likely  to  give  a  disinterested  account  of 
it,  or  from  those  who  mistake  for  it  some  very 

190 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


questionable  fragment.  The  duty  of  knowing 
is  not  an  abstract  duty  to  be  admitted  and  then 
put  aside,  but  a  practical,  daily  obligation,  which 
ought  to  influence  a  man  in  his  choice  of  occu- 
pations, books,  companions,  amusement.  Such  a 
virtue,  pursued  intelligently  and  not  pedantically, 
would  turn  a  man  from  the  meaningless  things 
of  life  to  the  significant  things,  to  the  thoughts 
and  activities  that  really  count. 

The  argument  for  knowledge  is  commonly 
either  pleasure  or  worldly  advantage,  both  per- 
fectly sound  arguments,  but  falling  short  of  the 
real  and  more  inspiring  compulsion.  Knowledge 
pursued  as  mere  intellectual  pleasure  is  prone  to 
lead  to  a  very  barren  scholarship,  to  a  trifling 
with  the  letter  of  the  law  and  a  profound  igno- 
rance of  the  spirit.  As  such  it  may  go  hand  in 
hand  with  the  most  complete  degeneracy  and 
decay,  and  may  have  nothing  in  common  with 
so  vital  a  thing  as  salvation  and  good  fortune. 
Times  of  extreme  individual  and  social  corrup- 
tion have  frequently  been  marked  by  what 
appears  to  be  an  elegant  scholarship,  a  ripe  cul- 
ture. But  such  knowledge  proves  on  examination 
to  be  a  highly  superficial  acquirement,  a  surface 
cleverness  in  matters  of  language  and  art,  and 
not  at  all  a  genuine  insight  into  life  as  a  whole. 
As  a  toy,  the  pursuit  of  this  sort  of  partial  know- 
ledge has  nothing  more  redeeming  in  it  than  the 

191 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

pursuit  of  wealth  or  athletics  or  political  power, 
and  events  have  shown  it  to  be  not  incompatible 
with  great  baseness  of  character. 

Yet  knowledge  is  commonly  presented  as  just 
this  sort  of  thing,  as  something  to  be  enjoyed 
as  a  separate  intellectual  possession  rather  than 
as  something  to  be  lived  by.  '  Knowledge  is 
better  than  riches '  has  a  fine  sound  to  it,  par- 
ticularly as  the  supply  is  supposed  to  be  more 
certain  and  more  amply  sufficient,  but  the  very 
classification  places  it  to  most  hearers  among  the 
things  to  be  desired  rather  than  among  the  neces- 
sities. So  religion,  as  voiced  by  her  less  intelligent 
apostles,  is  prone  to  seize  upon  this  unfruitful  sort 
of  knowledge  as  the  representative  of  knowledge, 
and  a  thing  so  little  related  to  righteousness  as 
to  be  even  antagonistic  to  it,  a  genuine  obstacle. 
This  denunciation  of  '  mere  knowledge '  is  per- 
fectly just,  for  the  pursuit  of  it  is  as  barren  intel- 
lectually as  it  is  morally,  but  the  denunciation 
of  the  false  article  must  not  blind  one  to  the 
sublime  excellence  of  genuine  knowledge.  And 
this  recalls  Emerson's  caution  that  men  are  so 
pro»e  to  mistake  the  means  for  the  ends,  that 
even  natural  history  has  its  pedants,  who  mis- 
take classification  for  knowledge. 

Knowledge  pursued  for  worldly  advantage, 
and  ending  there,  has  as  little  to  commend  it  as 
when  applied  as  a  veneer  in  making  our  some- 

192 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


what  raw  youth  presentable  in  society.  The 
result  is  highly  technical  and  mechanical,  and 
has  nothing  in  common  with  culture.  It  is  a  sort 
of  stock  in  trade,  the  sort  of  stock  selected  by 
persons  who  for  social  reasons,  or  lack  of  capital, 
decline  a  more  material  commerce.  It  is  well 
to  be  under  no  illusions  regarding  this  technical 
knowledge.  It  has  in  it  the  possibilities  of  great 
service  when  it  goes  along  with  a  fuller  and 
more  human  knowledge,  but  taken  alone,  it  is 
quite  as  likely  as  not  to  be  the  possession  of  out- 
and-out  barbarians.  We  have  all  met  these  per- 
sons, and  we  know  that  they  are  not  all  engineers 
and  chemists,  electricians  and  doctors.  The  tech- 
nical equipment  may  be  quite  as  offensive  and 
narrow  when  classed  as  philosophy  or  pedagogy, 
theology  or  letters. 

The  tendency  of  modern  conditions  to  develop 
this  technical  proficiency  at  the  expense  of  a 
more  genuine  and  lovable  culture  has  recently 
called  out  a  strong  protest  from  one  of  the  most 
distinguished  professors  in  the  faculty  at  Berlin, 
the  very  home  of  this  sort  of  specialism.  It  is 
le^ing  those  of  us  who  care  for  human  wealth 
to  caution  our  young  friends  against  too  early 
specialization,  to  recommend  to  them  a  liberal 
and  humane  education,  first  of  all,  and  a  specialty 
only  when  it  can  be  handled  broadly  and  fliexibly 
enough  not  to  obscure  the  more  universal  life. 

193 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

The  production  of  a  narrow  specialism  in  place 
of  commendable  knowledge  or  wisdom  is  quite 
inevitable  in  an  age  of  material  expansion.  It  is 
the  handmaiden  of  imperialism,  and  a  most  docile 
handmaiden.  Every  vocation  tends  to  take  itself 
very  seriously,  and  to  bolster  itself  up  with  a  curi- 
ous sort  of  professional  pride,  as  a  necessary  and 
important  part  of  the  social  order.  Tolstoy  has 
shown  in  his  sad  novel,  Resurrectioriy  that  even 
the  prostitute  invests  her  calling  with  a  certain 
social  dignity,  and  comes  to  regard  herself  as  a 
useful  and  necessary  member  of  society.  The 
demand  for  specialists,  at  whatever  cost,  is  sure 
to  be  met  as  long  as  people  fail  to  see  that  no 
sound  social  welfare  can  be  built  up  at  the  sacri- 
fice of  individual  good  fortune.  The  tendency 
of  the  moment  to  produce  specialists  surrounded 
with  stenographers,  telephones,  and  high  fees 
may  be  a  very  strong  tendency,  and  may  get 
itself  realized  in  the  lives  of  many  unreflective 
individuals,  but  this  does  not  make  it  commend- 
able, any  more  than  the  statement  of  a  somewhat 
hasty  moralist,  that  all  men  are  liars,  makes  lying 
permissible.  ^ 

But  there  is  discernible  at  the  present  time  a 
distinct  counter-current,  due  not  so  much  to  any 
recognition  of  the  sanctity  of  individual  integ- 
rity as  to  the  discovery  that  extreme  specialism 
defeats  its  own  end.    Looking  too  steadily  at  a 

194 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


detail,  losing  sight  of  its  function  as  a  part  of 
the  whole,  is  quite  as  disastrous  as  that  opposite 
habit  of  dealing  only  in  glittering  generalities. 
Both  processes  fail  to  discover  the  truth.  It  is 
coming  to  be  remarked  that  the  most  fruitful 
discoveries  and  inventions  are  produced  by  those 
speciahsts  who  a-re  armed  first  of  all  with  a  wide 
general  knowledge,  and  are  able  to  apply  this 
larger  outlook  to  the  special  problems. 

In  signaling  out  knowledge,  or  wisdom,  as 
the  one  cardinal  virtue,  the  one  that  in  reality 
includes  all  other  major  and  minor  virtues,  one 
does  not  mean  an  idle  erudition,  a  mass  of  ab- 
stract information,  a  technical  equipment  for  the 
sake  of  the  loaves  and  fishes,  an  acquaintance 
with  one  or  more  foreign  languages  without  any- 
thing special  to  say  in  any  of  them,  but  one 
means  that  cosmic  attitude  of  mind  which  leads 
one  to  seek  to  know  things  as  they  are,  and  to 
make  one's  thought  and  action  partake  of  the 
same  soundness  and  reality.  In  making  know- 
ledge and  virtue  one,  it  is  implied  that  know- 
ledge is  compelling,  that  one  cannot  know  the 
right  and  do  the  wrong,  an  implication  already 
admitted  and  defended,  not  out  of  any  over- 
reverence  for  knowledge,  any  mere  idolatry,  but 
for  the  simpler  and  more  convincing  reason 
that  precisely  this  implication  is  psychologically 
necessary  and  unavoidable.    We  are  always  run- 

195 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

ning  up  against  that  unescapable  stubbornness, 
that  a  man  cannot  do  anything  which  he  believes 
to  be  to  his  disadvantage.  Doing  as  one  likes  is 
the  way  of  the  world.  Reaping  what  one  sows 
is  the  nature  of  things.  Liking  to  do  what  is 
right  is  the  distinction  of  the  wise.  Happiness  is 
the  unavoidable  portion,  the  harvest. 

The  duty  of  becoming  wise  is  thus  shown  to 
be  the  all-inclusive  duty  of  the  moral  life.  Wis- 
dom is  the  child  of  experience,  the  knowledge 
of  things  as  they  are.  The  moral  argument  for 
knowledge  gives  it  precedence  over  all  other 
pursuits  and  aims,  makes  routine,  monotony,  and 
dullness  distinctly  immoral,  and  forbids  the  con- 
tinued drinking  at  fountains  which  have  long 
since  lost  their  power  to  refresh.  This  view  of 
knowledge  is  not  accidental  or  capricious.  It  is 
not  even  voluntary.  It  is  made  necessary  by  our 
initial  conception  of  right  and  wrong,  the  oppo- 
site polities  which  are  stamped  by  their  results, 
the  one  leading  to  welfare  and  the  other  to  dis- 
aster. In  giving  morals  this  basis  in  human 
experience,  one  establishes  the  corollary  that 
knowledge  is  the  one  cardinal  virtue. 

The  man  who  knows  the  meaning  of  truth  and 
honesty  and  courage  and  temperance  and  chastity 
and  hope  and  reverence  and  love,  who  knows 
what  their  denial  means,  by  that  very  knowledge 
makes  them  a  part  of  his  own  personal  desire,  a 

196 


THE   CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


part  of  his  ideal  of  good  fortune.  These  quali- 
ties are  virtues,  not  by  any  taHsmanic  power,  but 
purely  because  the  results  are  humanly  desirable. 
If  dishonesty  and  cowardice  and  debauchery  and 
malice  made  the  world  better,  and  men  and 
women  happier,  they  would  clearly  be  the  virtues ; 
and  their  opposites,  the  vices.  Wrong-doing  is 
only  psychologically  possible  by  reason  of  this 
inversion  of  values.  The  man  who  says  that  he 
believes  in  honesty,  but  nevertheless  continues 
to  steal,  is  simply  not  telling  the  truth.  He 
believes  in  honesty  when  it  does  not  conflict  with 
other  desires,  —  which  is  quite  a  different  thing 
from  beHeving  unreservedly  in  honesty.  A  fuller 
knowledge  would  have  persuaded  him  against 
making  the  disastrous  exception. 

One  virtue  there  is,  in  this  specified  list,  which 
seems,  from  the  importance  properly  attached  to 
it  by  all  high-minded  people,  to  deserve  separate 
mention  and  discussion,  and  the  more  so  since 
under  extraordinary  conditions  its  opposite  may 
become  the  higher  morality,  and  this  is  the  vir- 
tue of  truth-telling.  A  falsehood  so  badly  man- 
aged as  to  deceive  no  one  would  have  nothing 
to  commend  it  from  any  point  of  view.  But  the 
successful  falsehood  appears  at  times  so  altogether 
convenient  that  even  the  man  of  knowledge 
might  be  tempted  to  use  it,  were  he  not  re- 
strained  by   something   more  than   a   sense  of 

197 


THE  CHILDREN   OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

immediate  consequences.  Our  instinct  in  favor 
of  truth-telling  and  against  all  forms  of  prevari- 
cation is  so  strong  an  instinct  that  the  earlier 
moralists  fell  into  the  easy  mistake  of  supposing 
truth-telling  to  be  inherently  right  and  prevari- 
cating inherently  wrong,  and  of  ascribing  the 
instinct  to  a  conferred  and  infallible  conscience. 
In  spite  of  the  instinct,  the  habit  of  lying  is 
fairly  well  established  in  certain  classes,  and  one 
is  tempted  to  wish  that  there  were  some  higher 
power  to  proscribe  so  detestable  a  vice.  But  it  is 
important,  both  in  the  general  interests  of  truth 
and  of  the  foundations  of  the  empirical  morality, 
to  make  clear  that  truth-telling  is  inherently 
neither  right  nor  wrong,  but  depends  for  its  char- 
acter wholly  upon  the  results.  Where  these  are 
good,  it  is  an  unquestionable  virtue.  Under  the 
extraordinary  conditions  where  the  results  are 
not  good,  truth-telling  may  become  one  of  those 
mechanical  virtues  which  are  in  reality  vices. 

The  argument  for  truth-telling,  like  all  argu- 
ments concerning  human  conduct,  has  its  double 
aspect,  individual  and  social.  The  individual 
reasons  for  truth-telling  are  many,  but  three  at 
least  may  be  properly  pointed  out.  The  first  has 
to  do  with  one's  own  clearness  of  vision,  and  is 
purely  subjective.  To  see  things  as  they  are  is 
the  goal  of  the  earnest  intellectual  life.  It  is  an 
essential  condition  of  this  single-mindedness  that 

198 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


one  shall  also  report  things  as  one  sees  them 
with  the  utmost  attainable  accuracy.  It  would  be 
fatal  to  this  high  requirement  to  introduce  the 
least  suspicion  of  deception.  One  could  hardly 
expect  to  deceive  others  without  coming  ulti- 
mately to  deceiving  one's  own  self.  And  when  this 
happens,  we  have  the  suicide  of  all  trustworthy 
intellectual  work.  So  knowledge  demands  of  her 
votaries  the  most  flawless  truthfulness.  A  pre- 
varicating scientist  becomes  in  the  end  a  mere 
charlatan  and  his  work  without  possible  value. 
We  all  know  that  scientific  investigators  regard 
truth-telling  as  the  one  supreme  virtue,  and  false- 
hood as  the  one  unpardonable  sin.  This  simple 
code  has  ennobled  the  scientific  world  in  all 
countries  and  all  times. 

A  second  reason  is  one  of  personal  expediency. 
The  affairs  of  the  individual  life  are  materially 
furthered  by  the  confidence  of  one's  fellows.  A 
prudent  man,  whatever  his  view  of  abstract  truth, 
soon  recognizes  that  truthfulness,  or  at  least  a 
reputation  for  it,  is  the  price  of  this  confidence, 
and  essential  to  the  success  of  his  enterprises. 
The  business  man  who  gave  worthless  cheques 
would  soon  find  himself  more  embarrassed  than 
the  recipients  of  them.  In  more  serious  affairs, 
it  is  the  same  thing.  The  man  whose  word  is  not 
his  bond  is  hopelessly  bankrupt  in  all  matters 
of  social  enterprise,   a  practical  outcast.    How 

199 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

altogether  powerful  this  prudential  motive  is  can 
perhaps  best  be  appreciated  if  one  tries  for  a 
moment  to  imagine  what  life  would  be  personally 
were  one  suddenly  deprived  of  one's  reputation 
for  truthfulness.  There  are  few  of  us  who  would 
have  the  courage  to  face  so  arid  a  desert. 

One  may  properly  select  for  a  third  reason  the 
preservation  of  one's  own  sense  of  self-respect. 
Social  intercourse,  in  spite  of  its  petty  deceptions, 
is  carried  on  upon  the  general  assumption  that 
men  and  women  speak  the  truth.  Quite  apart 
from  any  fear  of  detection  and  consequent  loss 
of  confidence,  there  would  be  a  genuine  and  very 
annoying  feehng  that  one  had  taken  an  unfair 
advantage,  had  done  something  against  the  rules 
of  the  game,  had  cheated  in  effect,  and  had  a 
very  real  stain  upon  one's  honor.  Such  a  feeling 
is  intimately  connected  with  one's  sense  of  self- 
respect,  and  is  too  intolerable  a  wound  to  be 
lightly  dealt.  These  are  three  out  of  many  rea- 
sons, but  they  are  fairly  typical,  and  each  alone 
is  all-sufi&cient  to  make  a  man  truthful. 

In  practice,  there  is  a  fourth  and  still  more 
powerful  reason,  and  that  is  the  belief  that  all 
deviations  from  strict  truth-telling  are  offenses 
against  conscience.  Empirical  morality  does  not 
neglect  so  strong  an  agent  in  human  conduct  as 
the  human  conscience.  It  has  played  too  active  a 
part  in  events,  has  aroused  men  to  splendid  hero- 

200 


THE   CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


isms,  and  incited  them  to  brutal  wrong-doing. 
Perhaps  nothing  in  all  the  human  make-up 
needs  more  chastening  and  rationalizing  than 
just  this  inner  voice  of  conscience.  But  the  way 
to  instruct  the  conscience  is  through  the  intelli- 
gence, for  we  may  no  longer  regard  the  con- 
science as  the  primal  endowment  which  the  older 
moralists  pictured  it.  We  are  forced  to  regard 
it  wholly  as  a  resultant,  the  characteristic  moral 
color  in  a  man's  attitude  towards  life.  It  is  his 
own  name  for  the  moral  aspect  of  his  instincts, 
and  as  such  is  compounded  of  his  self-respect 
and  his  prudence  and  his  desire  to  know  things 
as  they  are. 

The  individual  argument  for  truth-telling 
might  be  summed  up  in  the  one  statement  that 
it  furthers  good  fortune.  And  the  social  argu- 
ment is  no  less  simple.  It  is  that  truth-telling 
furthers  the  social  welfare.  In  primitive  societies, 
where  the  idea  of  welfare  is  very  rudimentary, 
truth-telling  did  not  always  prevail.  It  began 
apparently  as  a  concession,  the  advantage  which 
a  man  was  willing  to  grant  to  his  family,  to  his 
immediate  friends,  to  the  tribe,  and  gradually  to 
the  increasing  circle  of  humankind.  It  took  but 
small  experience  to  show  that  the  advantages 
of  truth-telling  were  reciprocal.  The  concession 
became  an  obligation.  The  truth-habit  cannot 
be  said  as  yet  to  characterize  diplomacy,  or  to  be 

201 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

very  firmly  established  as  between  nation  and 
nation,  but  in  our  more  civilized  communities  it 
is  the  recognized  pact  between  man  and  man, 
and  represents  his  ideal  of  social  intercourse. 
Those  whose  own  hold  upon  the  virtue  is  some- 
what precarious  are  nevertheless  very  prompt  to 
denounce  its  absence  in  others.  So  general  is  the 
experience  that  falsehood  makes  all  human  rela- 
tions unnecessarily  difficult  and  uncertain,  that 
the  feeling  against  it  amounts  to  distinct  instinct. 
It  seems  to  us  that  we  have  the  right  to  know 
the  truth.  One  may  withhold  information, — 
that  is  a  question  of  courtesy  and  good-will.  But 
the  substitution  of  a  false  statement,  misinforma- 
tion, strikes  a  healthy-minded  man  as  a  direct  in- 
jury, a  direct  infringement  of  his  natural  rights. 
From  the  nature  of  the  case,  falsehood  can  be 
punished  by  law  only  when  it  can  be  shown  to 
have  inflicted  palpable  injury  to  person  or  pro- 
perty. The  mass  of  falsehood  must  go  legally 
unpunished.  It  is  fortunate  that  public  opinion 
is  so  outspoken  in  its  condemnation. 

The  individual  and  social  arguments  for  truth- 
telling  are  so  overwhelming  that  it  may  be  said 
to  have  become  a  part  of  the  race  instinct.  One 
sees  it  contravened  on  all  sides,  but  one  also 
sees  it  honored  in  the  most  unexpected  places, 
among  men  and  women  who  have  thrown  other 
and  perhaps  more  important  morals  to  the  winds. 

202 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


The  traditional  honor  among  thieves,  and  the 
scrupulousness  with  which  so-called  '  debts  of 
honor '  are  paid  by  persons  outside  the  conven- 
tional boundaries  of  morality  are  witnesses,  I 
think,  not  so  much  to  some  unpolluted  pigeon- 
hole of  virtue  in  the  persons  themselves,  as  to 
the  fact  that  falsehood  means  anarchy  and  dis- 
integration, that  truthfulness  and  respect  for  con- 
tract are  necessary,  even  in  a  world  of  rascals,  to 
make  the  game  go  on  at  all  and  to  have  any  sort 
of  human  relation  possible. 

It  seems  impossible  to  exaggerate  so  funda- 
mental a  virtue  as  truth-telling,  and  yet  one  sees 
it  at  times  pursued  so  mechanically,  and  so  much 
according  to  the  mere  letter,  that  the  real  spirit 
of  truth  is  sacrificed.  And  one  sees  it  not  unf  re- 
quently  erected  into  so  overshadowing  a  virtue, 
a  cardinal  virtue  of  almost  more  than  the  first 
magnitude,  that  the  gentler  virtues  of  courtesy 
and  generosity,  love  and  charity,  are  quite  lost 
sight  of.  One  feels  almost  justified  in  preferring 
a  lovable  liar.  But  here  again  the  defect  is  not 
in  the  truth-telling,  but  in  the  general  attitude 
towards  life,  the  narrowness  that  made  this  the 
one  virtue,  and  falsehood  the  one  vice. 

I  have  said  that  there  may  arise  conditions 
under  which  truth-telling  and  falsehood  change 
places  morally,  the  one  becoming  the  vice  and  the 
other  the  virtue.   But  I  have  hastened  to  add  that 

203 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

the  conditions  are  most  extraordinary.  It  re- 
mains to  inquire  what  they  are.  Since  truth-tell- 
ing is  neither  right  nor  wrong  inherently,  but 
depends  for  its  character  wholly  upon  results,  it 
is  an  easy  sophism  to  justify  minor  prevarications 
Qn  grounds  of  convenience  and  courtesy.  The 
ends  are  held  to  justify  the  means.  But  it  can  be 
shown  on  the  same  grounds  of  daily  expediency 
that  there  is  more  to  be  said  against  this  petty 
lying  than  in  favor  of  it.  The  oft-repeated  lie 
becomes  a  habit,  to  be  indulged  in  on  very  slight 
pretext  of  convenience,  and  finally  without  any 
pretext  whatever.  The  result  is  a  decided  eclipse 
of  one's  own  vision  of  things  as  they  are,  and  a 
loss  of  confidence  on  the  part  of  others  so  com- 
plete as  to  be  permanently  inconvenient.  It  is  evi- 
dent that  if  lying  be  ever  justifiable,  it  must  be 
when  done  in  the  grand  manner,  as  a  very  rare 
exception  and  for  ends  quite  beyond  the  ordinary. 
Furthermore,  it  must  be  when  ^  curious  combina- 
tion of  circumstances  makes  the  major  arguments 
for  truth-telling  no  longer  applicable.  These 
major  arguments,  as  we  have  seen,  are  the  fur- 
therance of  individual  insight,  what  we  have 
called  the  vision  of  things  as  they  are,  and  the 
promotion  of  social  welfare.  The  individual  per- 
ception is  never  furthered  by  any  form  of  un- 
truth. It  is  always  hindered.  To  that  extent, 
therefore,  a  lie  is  always  and  unequivocally  bad. 

204 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


There  are,  however,  conditions  under  which  the 
social  welfare  is  hindered  by  the  truth  and  pro- 
moted by  a  falsehood,  but  the  conditions  are 
altogether  abnormal  and  exceptional.  They  never 
prevail  within  the  social  order,  but  only  in  times 
of  violence,  when  the  normal,  healthy-minded 
person  has  to  talk  over  the  fence,  as  it  were,  with 
abnormal  and  unsocial  forces.  Three  cases  sug- 
gest themselves,  —  when  we  have  to  deal  with 
an  invading  army,  with  criminals,  or  with  crazy 
people.  In  none  of  these  cases  can  one  set  up 
wholesome  social  relations.  One  has  to  do  with 
unsocial,  destructive  forces,  and  morality  requires 
the  defeat  of  such  forces.  If  by  falsehood  an 
invading  army  can  be  foiled,  a  criminal  purpose 
brought  to  naught,  a  crazy  impulse  arrested,  then 
falsehood  is  manifestly  the  higher  morality. 

Happily,  these  cases  are  so  rare  that  the  aver- 
age man  is  not  called  upon  to  meet  them  even 
in  the  course  of  the  traditional  threescore  years 
and  ten.  But  their  discussion  is  well  worth  while 
both  to  emphasize  the  fact  that  even  so  imperative 
a  virtue  as  truth-telling  must  be  accounted  a 
means  rather  than  an  end  of  the  moral  life,  and 
to  point  out  that  on  individual  and  social  grounds 
alike,  any  violation  of  truth  requires  extraordi- 
nary sanction. 

There  remains  a  special  form  of  falsehood, 
too  easily  condoned,  which  seems  to  me  to  require 

ftOS 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

particular  mention.  I  mean  the  unintentional 
lie.  The  modern  world  calls  it  a  mistake,  and 
makes  no  great  fuss  over  it.  One  is  supposed  to 
fulfill  the  law  and  the  prophets  if  one  tell  what 
one  believes  to  be  the  truth,  even  though  the 
reported  truth  be  all  falsehood.  Not  so  the 
ancient  world.  It  esteemed  the  unintentional  lie 
something  worse  than  the  intentional  one,  main- 
taining that  the  one  deceived  both  the  speaker 
and  the  hearer,  while  the  other  deceived  only  the 
hearer.  There  is  something  to  be  said  in  defense 
of  both  positions,  but  both  represent  an  excess, 
the  one  placing  undue  emphasis  on  the  motive, 
regardless  of  performance,  and  the  other  undue 
emphasis  on  perception,  regardless  of  purpose. 

The  unintentional  liar  has  certainly  one  merit 
over  the  intentional  one,  that  his  general  atti- 
tude may  be  said  to  be  free  from  malice.  He  has 
at  least  a  greater  theoretical  regard  for  the  truth. 
But  his  attitude  cannot  be  called  blameless.  In 
the  end  it  makes  decidedly  for  untruth  and  inac- 
curacy, for  the  unintentional  lie  tends  to  become 
habitual  quite  as  surely  as  the  intentional  one. 
Moreover,  the  false  iii  formation  is  equally  mis- 
leading whether  circulated  knowingly  or  un- 
knowingly, and  capable  of  doing  quite  as  much 
direct  harm.  It  is  scant  comfort  to  the  sufferer 
from  it  to  learn  that  it  was  not  intended.  It 
recalls  what  Macaulay  said  when  he  was  hit  in  the 

206 


THE    CARDINAL   VIRTUES 


face  with  an  egg  no  longer  fresh  and  then  in- 
formed apologetically  that  it  was  meant  for  Mr. 
A.  '  I  wish/  said  Macaulay,  ^  that  you  had  meant 
it  for  me  and  hit  Mr.  A  ! ' 

This  unintentional  lying  is  so  common  because 
so  commonly  excused.  Lying,  indeed,  is  held  to 
be  too  strong  a  term  for  it,  since  lying,  they  say, 
has  come  to  mean  deliberate  falsehood.  But  by 
whatever  name  one  knows  it,  it  is  highly  repre- 
hensible, both  from  its  mischievous  effects  in 
misleading  others,  and  from  its  plain  indication 
of  the  absence  of  knowledge  and  carefulness  on 
the  part  of  the  liar  himself.  Nor  may  he  be 
excused  on  the  ground  that  his  good  intention 
promises  better  things  in  the  future,  for  inaccu- 
racy, as  has  been  pointed  out,  tends  to  become 
habitual  quite  as  much  as  does  deliberate  lying. 
To  modern  eyes  the  intentional  liar  is  quite  as 
much  of  a  rascal  as  the  unintentional  one,  and 
even  more.  To  the  lying  itself  he  adds  the  un- 
social willingness  to  lie,  and  to  profit  personally 
by  the  deception.  His  whole  attitude  towards  life 
is  most  undesirable,  and  while  it  may  be  marked 
in  the  beginning  by  a  more  wholesome  perception, 
there  must  result  in  the  end  that  inevitable  be- 
fogging of  the  vision  which  is  one  of  the  greatest 
subjective  evils  of  the  whole  falsehood  habit. 

It  is  worth  remarking  that  in  America  the 
unintentional  liar  goes  scot  free.    He  may  say  or 

207 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

publish  whatever  uncharitable  and  damaging 
thing  he  pleases  about  his  neighbor,  and  unless 
it  can  be  shown  to  be  done  with  deliberate  mal- 
ice, —  a  most  difficult  sort  of  proof  to  estab- 
lish, —  he  goes  unpunished.  This  sort  of  liberty 
accounts  for  the  license  shown  by  our  less  princi- 
pled newspapers  in  their  handling  of  all  personal 
afPairs,  and  constitutes  an  abuse  which  demands 
immediate  and  strenuous  redress.  In  England 
the  unintentional  liar  is  held  accountable.  When 
he  publishes  personal  matters  and  misreports 
facts,  he  is  open  to  legal  action,  whatever  his 
own  belief.  It  is  maintained,  and  very  properly, 
that  it  is  his  business  to  know  the  truth  before 
he  ventures  to  make  it  public. 

The  moral  life  is  not  .a  matter  of  compart- 
ments. It  does  not  consist  in  the  mechanical 
pursuit  of  one  or  two  or  three  virtues,  however 
fundamental  they  may  be.  It  is  an  attitude  of 
mind,  a  tendency  in  conduct.  It  is  a  man's  point 
of  view  as  expressed  in  his  daily  behavior.  If  it 
is  to  be  summed  up  in  any  one  cardinal  virtue, 
the  virtue  chosen  must  be  some  such  virtue  as 
wisdom  or  love  or  charity,  since  these  are  not 
so  much  specific  qualities  as  sources,  the  f oun- 
tainheads  of  all  good  qualities.  In  this  sense  it 
is  quite  literally  true  that  love  is  the  fulfilling  of 
the  law,  for  a  soul  so  illumined  is  capable  of  all 
good  deeds,  and  is  incapable  of  evil. 


X 


THE    DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC 
GOODNESS 

THE  moral  life  has  two  distinct  phases,  the 
period  before  we  eat  of  the  tree  of  the 
knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  and  the  period 
after  we  eat  of  it.  One  phase  is  unconscious 
and  the  other  phase  is  conscious.  Life  itself,  the 
world,  is  the  schoolmaster  during  the  first  period, 
and  a  highly  effective  schoolmaster  it  is,  since 
it  whips  even  the  most  unreflective  into  some 
semblance  of  morality,  and  ends  by  creating  a 
consciousness  in  the  pupil  strong  enough  to  trans- 
form him  into  an  assistant  master.  In  the  period 
of  conscious  morahty,  we  have  man  acting  in  con- 
junction with  nature.  From  an  historical  point 
of  view,  both  periods  are  deeply  interesting. 
From  the  personal  and  human  point  of  view,  the 
second  period  is  the  more  significant,  for  now  it 
is  that  man  seems  no  longer  the  mere  plaything 
of  fate,  but  to  have  a  genuine  hand  in  his  own 
destiny. 

It  cannot  be  said  that  a  man  ever  sets  out 
consciously  to  become  moral,  for  he  must  already 
have  made  considerable  progress  in  morahty  to 

209 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

recognize  that  there  is  such  a  problem.  At  that 
later  stage  in  the  operation  when  he  takes  a  hand 
voluntarily,  the  process  is  one  of  becoming  more 
moral,  and  when  it  is  taken  up  seriously,  it  is 
in  reality  a  problem  in  educational  method.  It  is 
a  unique  problem,  Hke  that  larger  problem  in 
education  when  a  man  has  done  with  the  official 
machinery  of  tutelage,  —  school,  college,  and  uni- 
versity,—  and  becomes  his  own  instructor.  So 
in  the  process  of  morality,  a  man  becomes  both 
master  and  pupil,  proposes  the  tasks,  performs 
them,  passes  judgment  on  the  performance.  It  is 
a  relation  in  which  it  behooves  the  pupil  to  keep 
on  excellent  terms  with  the  master,  for  there  are 
no  vacations,  and  examinations  come  any  day  and 
every  day.  As  Stevenson  puts  the  matter, '  Above 
all,  let  a  man  keep  friends  with  himself,  without 
capitulations  or  compromises.' 

We  have  tried  to  state  the  major  task  of  indi- 
vidual moraHty  and  some  of  the  minor  ones,  and 
to  indicate  the  standards  by  which  the  perform- 
ance of  them  is  to  be  judged.  An  equally  prac- 
tical question,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  seeker 
after  good  fortune,  is  the  selection  of  an  effective 
method.  The  doctrine  of  automatic  goodness 
appears  to  offer  such  a  method,  and  apparently 
the  only  one  which  promises  genuine  morality 
without  loss  of  human  charm.  For  it  must  be 
admitted  at  the  outset  that  the  quest  of  morality 

210 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

in  this  frank  and  conscious  way  has  an  unfortu- 
nate tendency  to  land  one  in  priggishness,  and 
the  most  besotted  moralist  never  had  the  cour- 
age to  call  that  good  fortune. 

If  we  agree  with  Professor  James  that  educa- 
tion, as  a  practical  process,  a  method,  consists  in 
the  organization  of  habits  into  fixed  tendencies 
to  behavior,  it  is  very  clear,  I  think,  that  educa- 
tion is  only  our  human  name  for  evolution,  and 
includes  the  pursuit  of  goodness  and  of  health 
and  of  riches  and  of  all  the  other  desires  of  the 
human  heart,  quite  as  properly  as  the  pursuit 
of  scholastic  knowledge.  As  a  definition  it  is 
complete,  inasmuch  as  it  is  perfectly  general. 
It  is,  however,  simply  a  definition  of  means,  and 
has  nothing  to  say  about  ends.  Such  a  process 
covers  all  education,  whether  good  or  bad,  and 
all  agencies  inside  the  school  and  out.  I  am  not 
disposed  to  quarrel  with  this  inclusiveness,  for 
according  to  my  own  way  of  thinking,  much  of 
our  current  education  does  consist  in  the  organ- 
ization of  bad  habits  ;  and  furthermore,  one  who 
studies  the  process  at  first  hand  must  be  increas- 
ingly persuaded  that  education  does  cover  the 
whole  twenty-four  hours  and  concern  itself  with 
the  whole  fife,  whether  we  find  this  inclusive- 
ness convenient  or  not.  So  admirable  a  defini- 
tion cannot  easily  be  improved  upon,  but  as  a 
programme  of  action  tending  to  morality,  we  may 

211 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

amend  it  to  read  the  organization  of  good  habits 
into  fixed  tendencies  to  behavior.  The  more  thor- 
ough the  organization,  the  more  pronounced  the 
good  fortune,  the  more  assured  the  welfare. 

Habits  are  not  exclusively  human,  nor  are  they 
necessarily  or  even  generally  marked  by  con- 
sciousness. We  have  of  late  been  extending  the 
conception  to  include  not  only  animal  and  plant, 
but  inanimate  things  as  well.  We  speak  in  all 
seriousness  of  the  habits  of  earth  and  air,  fire  and 
water.  Practically,  this  is  what  we  mean  by  the 
reign  of  natural  law.  Since  the  material  world 
has  these  fixed  habits,  they  constitute  the  very 
handle  by  which  we  come  into  control  of  material 
things.  By  knowing  the  set  of  conditions  which 
evoke  the  habit,  we  have  only  to  produce  these 
and  the  habit  itself  is  our  servitor.  Under  certain 
definite  and  ascertainable  conditions  a  current  of 
electricity  is  generated  in  a  coil  of  copper  wire. 
We  study  this  very  curious  habit,  and  the  con- 
ditions which  most  fully  call  it  forth,  and  pro- 
ceed to  design  and  manufacture  a  dynamo.  We 
may  say  in  all  reverence  that  it  is  through  these 
inherent  habits  that  God  himself  operates  to 
transform  the  world.  The  habits  are  fixed,  but 
they  manifest  themselves  only  under  given  con- 
ditions. In  science  we  observe  always  this  uni- 
formity in  the  action  of  natural  law.  It  is  the 
only  thing  that  makes  science  possible,  indeed 

212 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

the  only  thing  that  makes  sanity  possible.  A 
world  of  out-and-out  caprice,  a  world  without  fixed 
habits,  would  be  a  world  of  entire  unreason. 

And  yet  the  veriest  pessimist  would  hesitate 
to  call  our  present  world  monotonous.  The  field 
of  habits  is  not  a  meagre  territory.  It  is  a  vast 
region,  so  little  explored  that  the  surest  thing  in 
life  is  still  the  unexpected.  There  are  millions 
of  new  and  untried  combinations  of  conditions, 
which  will  evoke  an  equal  number  of  remarkable 
and  novel  habits.  It  is  the  field  of  discovery  and 
experiment,  a  field  which  never  before  in  the 
history  of  the  world  claimed  so  many  earnest 
devotees,  for  never  before  has  man  had  such  wide 
control  of  the  tyrant  condition,  and  such  large 
opportunity  of  disclosing  new  habits  in  matter 
and  force.  A  discovery  is  the  announcement  of  an 
ascertained  habit.  When  other  investigators  test 
the  habit  and  find  that  it  holds,  the  news  passes 
by  common  consent  into  our  body  of  accepted 
truth.  By  so  much  is  the  intellectual  wealth  of 
the  world  increased. 

The  charm  of  the  empirical  sciences,  the  sci- 
ences of  experience,  consists  for  many  minds  in 
just  this  pleasurable  certainty.  The  test  of  sci- 
ence, according  to  Comte,  is  the  power  of  pre- 
diction. 

It  is  perhaps  less  of  a  strain  upon  the  common 
usage  of  words  when  we  come  to  speak  of  the 

213 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

habits  of  plants  and  animals.  Yet  there  is  no 
difference  in  kind.  Habit  is  practically  the  reac- 
tion to  stimulus.  In  the  crystal  world,  we  call  the 
stimulus  conditions,  the  conditions  of  temper- 
ature, pressure,  moisture,  and  the  like.  In  the 
organic  world,  we  call  the  stimulus  environment. 
In  this  world  of  life,  the  elements  are  more 
subtle  and  more  flexible,  and  apparently  offer 
more  interesting  fields  of  control,  fields  whose 
very  margin  only  we  have  come  to  occupy,  but 
there  is  discernible  the  same  essential  uniformity. 
Perhaps  in  all  nature  there  is  nothing  that 
seems  quite  so  capricious  as  plant  hybrids,  yet  it 
has  recently  been  shown  that  the  habits  of  the 
hybrid  are  the  mathematical  mean  of  the  habits 
of  its  progenitors.  The  results  of  control  in  the 
organic  world  have  been  so  marvelous  that  it 
is  hardly  unreasonable  to  feel  that  man  has  it 
within  his  assured  power  to  change  the  very  face 
of  nature.  The  agriculturist  has  brought  about 
modifications  of  flowers  and  fruit,  vegetables 
and  grain,  of  which  nature  seems  to  offer  no 
prototype.  The  scientific  breeder  has  produced 
almost  new  species  of  domestic  animals. 

The  more  primal  and  inflexible  things  endure, 
fire  and  water,  rock  and  forest,  binding  the  old 
world  to  the  new,  but  they  have  been  put  to  so 
changed  uses  that  they  might  almost  be  said  to 
have  had  a  new  soul  developed  in  them.    The 

214 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

more  fluid  organic  world  of  herb  and  animal  has 
been  literally  transformed.  On  all  sides,  totally 
new  habits  have  been  engendered  or  discovered. 

It  is  true  that  nature  was  doing  this  all  along 
before  man  came,  was  organizing  the  chance 
occurrence  into  fixed  habits.  But  the  point  of 
interest  in  these  newer,  man-imposed  habits  is 
that  they  have  all  of  them  a  distinct  and  novel 
turn,  that  they  all  contribute  to  human  conven- 
ience and  service.  This  constitutes  the  marked 
difference  between  a  civilized  landscape  and  a 
wilderness.  In  the  one,  only  those  habits  of  the 
plant  and  animal  world  which  are  agreeable  to 
man  have  been  encouraged  and  developed.  All 
nature  ministers  to  beauty,  to  nourishment,  to  pro- 
tection. In  the  wilderness,  it  is  quite  otherwise. 
Man  is  the  intruder,  and  there  is  an  apparent 
indifference  to  his  fate.  The  same  human  possi- 
bilities exist,  but  they  are  undeveloped.  The  old 
primal  habits  of  brute  force  and  plant  sturdiness 
are  still  in  possession.  But  even  the  wilderness 
owes  its  preservation  to  human  plans  and  pur- 
poses. In  this  continuous  sweep  of  evolution 
nature  still  operates,  but  she  operates  through 
her  deputy,  —  man.  This  one  condition  changes 
the  whole  trend  of  the  process. 

When  we  pass  from  the  obvious  world  of  habit 
in  this  non-human  nature  to  our  own  more  subtle 
human   world,   we  enter  a  theatre  vastly  more 

215 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

interesting  and  complex,  vastly  less  obvious  and 
elemental,  but  not  one  whit  more  startling. 
Nature  has  been  imposing  habits  so  imperious 
that  they  almost  discourage  one's  faith  in  human 
freedom.  The  chemistry  and  physics  of  the 
human  body,  the  matter  and  energy,  have  the 
fixed  habits  of  the  mineral  world.  As  organisms, 
we  have  the  habits  of  life  and  death,  of  growth 
and  nutrition,  of  fatigue  and  sleep,  of  appetite 
and  satisfaction,  quite  as  well  developed  as  have 
our  brothers,  the  brutes.  As  members  of  the 
great  world  of  matter  and  motion  and  life,  we 
must  share  in  the  fixed  habits  of  that  world,  and 
must  meet  the  fate  which  those  habits  impose. 
Plants  and  animals  of  a  certain  set  of  habits  sur- 
vive ;  plants  and  animals  of  a  different  set  perish. 
It  is  nature's  way  of  settling  accounts,  of  sepa- 
rating the  fit  from  the  unfit,  of  carrying  on  her 
own  inscrutable  process  of  evolution.  Just  now, 
as  we  have  seen,  the  day  of  judgment  for  plant 
and  animal  is  in  man's  hand.  He  decides  which 
set  of  habits  shall  be  accorded  life  and  progeny, 
and  which  set  death  and  extinction. 

We  hardly  appreciate  how  complete  is  this 
human  tyranny,  for  we  have  grown  up  in  the 
midst  of  it.  I  was  once  going  over  a  beautifully 
cultivated  farm  in  Pennsylvania,  and  when  we 
came  to  the  boundary,  the  farmer  looked  over 
into  an  adjoining  field  and  pointed  out  to  me  a 

216 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

flourishing  group  of  weeds  with  a  trench  dug 
completely  around  them.  Then  he  added  that  he 
would  not  have  them  on  his  own  place  for  five 
hundred  dollars,  that  they  were  illegitimate,  and 
that  if  they  spread  to  his  fields,  the  law  would 
grant  him  damages.  I  beheve  the  obnoxious 
plants  were  Canada  thistles,  but  it  sounded  odd 
to  hear  them  spoken  of  as  illegitimate.  Certain 
animals  are  also  contraband.  As  we  all  know,  the 
mongoose  is  forbidden,  unless  it  come  as  Rikki- 
Tikki-Tavi  and  between  the  covers  of  a  book. 
Legislation,  as  well  as  public  and  private  opinion, 
is  thus  taking  a  hand  in  organic  evolution,  say- 
ing not  so  much  what  shall  as  what  shall  not  be 
fostered  in  the  way  of  plant  and  animal  habits. 

But  meanwhile  nature  has  been  dealing  with 
man  in  precisely  the  same  fashion.  It  is  not  a 
hazard,  the  type  of  man  that  becomes  increasingly 
representative.  Nature's  earliest  ministrations 
seemed  as  little  human  as  in  the  animal  world 
pure  and  simple.  The  set  of  habits  which  then 
brought  dominance  would  now  lead  to  the  gallows, 
for  they  were  the  habits  of  untempered  force. 
The  survival  of  the  fittest  seems  at  first  sight  a 
blind  brute  process.  But  in  reahty  it  is  essentially 
intellectual  and  spiritual,  for  fitness  is  determined 
in  the  end  by  the  Zeit-Geist,  and  not  by  mere 
physical  environment.  Taken  in  sufficiently  long 
sweeps,  evolution  and  education  mean  the  same 

217 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

thing,  the  unfolding  and  perfecting  of  the  human 
spirit. 

Just  as  the  required  habits  in  the  plant  and 
animal  world  are  now  the  habits  of  human  usa- 
bleness,  so  the  required  habits  in  the  human  world 
are  now  social  and  spiritual,  have  to  do  with 
the  furtherance  of  a  strictly  human  excellence, 
the  excellence  of  strength  and  beauty  and  accom- 
plishment and  goodness.  The  environment  is  no 
longer  favorable  to  the  habits  of  untempered force. 
When  they  appear,  they  are  branded  as  crime, 
and  society  punishes  them,  even  to  the  extent  of 
the  death  penalty.  Nature  now  demands  habits 
which  make  for  the  enrichment  of  human  inter- 
course and  welfare.  The  men  who  have  these 
human  social  habits  bear  the  very  stamp  of  na- 
ture's approval  in  the  radiant  glory  of  their  lives. 
The  men  who  fail  of  these  habits  never  really 
taste  of  life.  They  grow  morbid  and  dyspeptic, 
die  a  hundred  deaths,  and  finally  end  quite  be- 
lieving that  the  game  was  not  worth  the  candle. 

We  may  say,  I  think,  that  the  habits  exacted 
of  the  successful  man  by  nature  are  passing  over 
a  scale  of  which  at  least  four  magnitudes  are  now 
perceptible,  —  individualistic,  domestic,  social, 
and  psychic. 

Mere  survival  demands  highly  individualistic 
habits.  A  man  must  live,  even  if  his  one  purpose 
be  altruism.    In  more  savage  times,  the  funda- 

218 


DOCTRINE    OF    AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

mental  virtues  must  be  so  strongly  self-preserving 
that  there  is  small  chance  for  the  larger  habits. 
Even  in  civilized  society,  in  the  great  republic 
of  to-day,  one  still  sees  men  who  have  not  got 
beyond  this  narrow  individualism,  but  they  do 
not  represent  either  the  happy  or  the  successful 
portion  of  mankind.  Human  intercourse  makes 
up  too  large  a  part  of  modern  life  to  be  neglected 
without  suffering  shipwreck.  Indeed,  I  know  of 
nothing  that  so  completely  defeats  its  own  end 
as  that  self-centred  view  of  life  wiiich  desires  to 
receive,  but  not  to  give.  The  selfishness  which 
keeps  a  man  from  ideal  participation  in  the  lives 
of  other  persons  robs  him  more  gravely  than  it 
can  possibly  rob  them. 

It  was  a  tremendous  advance  when  to  the 
strictly  individualistic  habits  were  added  distinctly 
domestic  ones.  Not  only  did  the  concern  for  a 
family  group  bring  out  new  powers  in  the  man 
himself,  but  it  surrounded  him  with  a  care  and 
protection  for  which  no  equivalent  or  substitute 
has  yet  been  found.  The  only  child  and  the 
bachelor  escape  a  discipline  which  may  have  its 
trying  sides,  but  which  in  the  history  of  the  race 
has  played  a  truly  beneficent  and  educational 
part.  It  is  much  to  be  regretted,  however,  that 
the  majority  of  our  people  stop  here.  They  are 
contented  with  the  exercise  of  individual  and 
domestic  virtue,  and  this  world  of  limited  habit 

219 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

has  even  more  criers-up  than  runners-down.  It  is 
represented  by  the  men  who  say  frankly  that  it 
is  cheaper  to  be  badly  governed  than  to  take  the 
time  from  their  business  to  put  municipal  affairs 
in  order,  the  men  who  spend  their  days  over  the 
bread-and-butter  problem  almost  exclusively,  and 
who  so  far  fatigue  themselves  that  at  night  they 
take  to  slippers  and  creature  comforts.  It  is  repre- 
sented by  the  women  who  audibly  pride  them- 
selves on  the  small  part  they  take  in  life,  who 
belong  perhaps  to  anti-suffrage  societies  and  other 
obstructing  bodies,  and  for  whom  marriage  means 
total  immersion  in  a  very  narrow  round  of  home 
duties. 

Where  habit  thus  stops  'at  one's  own  front 
door,  it  simply  means  that  individual  selfishness 
has  given  place  to  family  selfishness. 

I  am  not  insensible  to  the  peace  and  beauty 
of  these  fireside  pictures,  and  I  should  be  quite 
content  with  them  as  the  goal  of  human  endea- 
vor, if  they  showed  or  could  show  the  highest 
type  of  individual,  —  for  after  all,  what  nature 
is  after  is  the  perfection  of  the  individual,  —  but 
one  knows  beyond  peradventure  that  this  is  not 
the  case.  The  exclusion  of  the  larger  world- 
interests  makes  smaller  men  and  women.  These 
lives  without  vista  are  the  lives  which  invite  an 
intolerable  ennui,  and  when  the  home  is  broken 
up  by  death  or  marriage  or  other  circumstances, 

220 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

as  for  nine-tenths  of  us  it  is  ultimately  bound  to 
be,  the  survivors  finish  the  journey  with  no  hand 
on  the  rudder,  essentially  shipwrecked. 

Furthermore,  as  a  matter  of  mere  self-interest, 
the  limited  habit  is  bad,  even  disastrous,  for  into 
these  smaller  lives  the  larger  opportunities  do 
not  come.  A  world  for  which  you  have  no  gen- 
uine concern  very  naturally  and  properly  re- 
venges itself  by  manifesting  very  little  concern 
for  you.  The  most  potent  cause  of  failure  in  life 
is  selfishness.  How  many  young  men  one  can  re- 
call, men  of  education,  family,  natural  abiHty,  of 
every  endowment  indeed  except  the  warm  heart, 
who  are  making  precious  little  out  of  their  lives 
in  the  way  of  character  or  position  or  money,  for 
the  very  simple  reason  that  in  their  excessive 
egoism  they  fail  to  come  into  generous  and 
human  relation  with  their  fellows.  These  experi- 
ments in  selfishness,  whether  made  by  others 
or  by  one's  self,  abundantly  prove  that  it  is  not 
the  path  to  human  worth  and  happiness.  As  we 
have  said,  the  most  thoroughgoing  and  success- 
ful selfishness  is  an  enlightened  altruism.  Or  to 
put  it  once  more  into  our  preferred  formula, 
individual  good  fortune  and  social  welfare  are 
essentially  the  same  thing. 

The  world  is  beginning  to  find  this  out,  to 
find  that  the  larger  life  with  its  swing  of  events 
and  rush  of  fresh  air  is  the  life  to  be  desired.  One 

221 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

sees  on  all  sides,  and  especially  in  our  older  and 
more  congested  communities,  the  appearance  of  a 
set  of  habits  which  are  distinctly  social,  a  gen- 
uine, practical  concern  for  the  neighbor,  for  the 
nation,  and  in  the  largest  souls  for  international- 
ism, for  man  himself,  regardless  of  race  or  creed 
or  color.  These  social  habits  are  growing,  and  not 
because  men  are  growing  more  saintly,  more 
other-worldly,  more  liable  to  die  young,  but  for 
the  better  reason  that  they  are  growing  more 
divinely  human  and  more  intelligent.  The  mere 
possession  of  a  body  is  not  such  a  tremendous 
possession.  At  best  it  cannot  grow  much  beyond 
six  feet  or  last  much  over  seventy  years.  The 
average  age  of  the  world  is  indeed  not  over  forty. 
But  the  spirit  which  centres  in  the  body  has  in 
it  the  possibility  of  tremendous  expansion.  In  a 
world  which  is  made  up  of  a  very  small  ingre- 
dient of  matter  and  motion  and  a  very  large 
ingredient  of  consciousness,  of  intellect,  the  more 
promising  field  for  expansion  is  in  this  human 
world  of  knowing  and  feeling  and  being,  the 
world  of  human,  social  intercourse.  The  worth 
of  social-mindedness  does  not  depend  upon  the 
sacrifice  of  the  individual,  but  upon  his  fullest 
seK-realization. 

It  might  seem  as  if  habits  so  inclusive  as  to 
take  in  the  known  human  world  in  their  interest 
and  sympathy  might   satisfy  the  most  earnest 

222' 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 


apostle  of  the  larger  life ;  but  if  we  are  to  accept 
the  prophecy  of  the  most  evolved  souls  in  our 
midst,  there  is  now  emerging  a  fourth  and  very 
distinct  set  of  habits,  the  habits  we  call  psychic. 
They  have  to  do  with  the  world  of  pure  under- 
standing and  thought,  that  world  in  which  man 
finds  his  most  abiding  pleasures  and  reaches  his 
widest  control.  The  recognition  of  these  habits 
and  their  cultivation  is  as  characteristic  of  our 
modern  intellectual  life  as  concentration  is  of  our 
industrial  activity.  This  psychic  power  shows 
itself  in  our  current  transcendentalism,  in  the 
spilling  over  of  the  contents  of  life  from  the 
narrower  limits  of  the  objectively  known  into 
that  freer  space  which  becomes  increasingly  real 
to  the  persistent  voyager.  So  distinct  are  these 
psychic  habits  from  the  ordinary  individualistic 
habits  of  our  e very-day  world  that  they  appear 
to  the  majority  as  a  mere  fantasy,  a  cobweb  tis- 
sue that  melts  away  before  a  heartier,  diet  and 
more  vigorous  exercise.  But  their  recurrence 
and  extension  make  it  impossible  to  dismiss  them 
in  this  cavalier  fashion.  A  juicy  beefsteak  does 
not  always  rout  them.  Just  now  they  are  of  par- 
ticular social  interest,  because  they  appear  to  be 
at  the  bottom  of  that  profound  religious  revival 
which  is  sweeping  over  the  intellectual  world,  a 
revival  not  prompted  by  any  vulgar  individualistic 
fears  either  for  the  present  or  the  hereafter,  but 

223 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

prompted  by  that  deeper  sentiment  which  dis- 
covers in  the  unseen  an  opportunity  for  still 
wider  interests  and  larger  life.  It  is  a  natural 
reaction  against  the  contracting  influence  of  that 
materialism  which  was,  but  is  no  longer,  the  creed 
of  science. 

It  would  be  untrue  to  the  fact  to  represent 
these  sets  of  habits  as  so  many  concentric  wrap- 
pings which  a  man  puts  on  much  as  he  does  the 
various  articles  of  his  apparel.  They  are  far 
more  intimate  than  that.  And  apparently  nature 
demands  that  in  making  new  conquests  we  shall 
not  lose  our  hold  upon  the  old.  The  final  set  of 
habits,  so  golden  as  to  come  safely  out  of  the 
crucible  of  events,  must  comprise  in  their  ensem- 
ble the  best  in  each  group,  —  must  have  indi- 
vidual integrity,  domestic  virtue,  social  worth, 
and  psychic  power.  This,  as  I  understand  it,  is 
the  real  process  of  evolution,  the  unfolding  and 
perfecting  of  the  human  spirit  through  the 
organization  and  extension  of  habit.  And  this, 
too,  is  the  inner  content  of  education,  whether 
nature's  schooling,  or  the  unconscious  pressure 
of  society,  or  the  conscious  influence  of  the  pro- 
fessed teacher.  The  impressing  of  habits  is  the 
main  business  of  life,  whether  the  process  be 
called  evolution  or  education,  and  while  it  is  a 
business  which  diminishes  in  activity  both  with 
the  approach  of  sleep  and  old  age,  it  neverthe- 

224 


DOCTRINE   OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

less  covers  the  whole  of  the  twenty-four  hours 
and  the  whole  of  the  normal  lifetime. 

Just  as  the  process  itself  is  inevitable,  so,  willy- 
niUy,  we  are  all  of  us  educators.  The  school- 
masters need  not  be  so  proud.  Everybody  is 
doing  quite  the  same  thing,  and  the  effectiveness 
of  the  operation  depends  not  upon  whether  one 
stand  in  a  schoolroom,  but  upon  whether  one 
have  a  strong  and  impressive  personality.  By 
what  we  do,  by  what  we  omit  to  do,  we  are  all 
of  us  reacting  upon  the  plastic  human  material 
about  us,  giving  some  habits  added  persistence, 
weakening  or  breaking  down  other  habits,  even 
creating  altogether  new  habits.  It  is  a  serious 
business,  this  living,  for  the  habits  we  have 
formed,  and  are  forming,  not  only  affect  our- 
selves, but  have  a  thousand  reflections  elsewhere. 

Men  are  so  many  bundles  of  habits,  just  as  one 
chemical  element  is  distinguished  from  another 
by  its  characteristic  bundle  of  qualities.  Some- 
how or  other,  the  qualities  are  wrapped  up  in  the 
element  itself  and  confer  individuality.  So  habits 
are  registered  and  fixed  in  the  organism  itself, 
and  in  their  aggregate  constitute  the  man.  It  is 
this  that  gives  them  their  life-and-death  impor- 
tance. In  dealing  with  them,  we  are  not  dealing 
with  mere  will-o'-the-wisps,  with  capricious  things 
which  a  man  may  put  on  and  off,  like  a  top  coat 
in  variable  weather.    We  are  deahng  with  definite 

225 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

states  and  conditions  of  organic  tissue,  with  an 
architectural  structure  which  has  a  surprising 
amount  of  obstinacy  about  it,  which  can  be 
changed  in  any  large  way  only  by  a  renovation 
almost  as  thorough  as  if  we  were  transforming  a 
Greek  temple  into  a  Gothic  cathedral. 

We  have  no  direct  experience  of  an  intelligence 
pure  and  simple  not  connected  with  matter,  with 
brain  tissue  and  spinal  cord.  We  know,  too,  that 
as  far  as  we  are  able  to  follow  such  subtle  and 
elusive  things,  there  is  no  emotion,  no  impulse, 
no  thought,  no  conscious  act,  which  has  not  its 
corresponding  molecular  activity  in  the  brain. 
Each  event  in  the  intellectual  life  is  accompanied 
by  a  parallel  event  in  the  bodily  life.  We  need 
not  enter  upon  the  vexed  question  as  to  whether 
the  relation  is  that  of  cause  and  effect,  and  which 
is  the  cause  and  which  the  effect,  or  whether  the 
relation  is  an  inscrutable  parallelism,  a  '  world- 
riddle.'  The  matter  of  present  importance  is 
that  this  parallelism  is  assuredly  established,  and 
that  to  ignore  it  is  to  reckon  without  one's  host. 
Separate  acts  and  thoughts  are  registered,  and 
by  repeated  registration  turn  into  those  stubborn 
things,  sometimes  ugly  and  sometimes  beneficent, 
which  we  call  fixed  habits.  If  we  use  the  rather 
vague  term  of  '  brain  path '  for  the  molecular 
changes  accompanying  any  given  act  or  emotion 
or  thought,  we  know  by  experience  that  these 

226 


DOCTRINE   OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

paths  tend  to  become  established,  and  that  a 
diminishing  impulse  is  needed  to  set  the  changes 
into  operation.  Repetition  grows  easier  and  easier, 
until  finally  the  activity  attracts  so  little  o£  our 
attention  that  it  ends  by  becoming  automatic. 
A  habit  is  thus  impressed  upon  the  organism, 
as  fixed  and  certain  for  the  time  being  as  the 
habit  of  the  diamond  to  crystallize  in  isometric 
solids.  So  firmly  impressed  are  these  tendencies 
to  behavior,  impressed  in  the  life  tissue  itself, 
that  rehabilitation  in  any  thoroughgoing  sense  is 
sometimes  practically  impossible.  The  brain  paths 
have  become  ruts,  and  the  winter  of  long  usage 
and  old  age  has  frozen  them  beyond  the  power  of 
any  leveling. 

Since  habits  do  not  have  their  home  in  an 
immaterial  intention,  but  in  the  bodily  tissue  it- 
self, wrapped  up  in  the  destiny  which  each  man 
creates  in  his  own  body,  it  is  evident  that  the 
time  to  impress  habits  is  in  early  Hf  e,  in  childhood 
and  youth,  when  the  material  is  still  plastic.  Our 
brain  physiologists  agree  with  our  moralists  in 
pointing  out  this  most  important  social  truth.  It 
is  hard  to  teach  old  dogs  new  tricks.  In  the  shap- 
ing of  this  plastic  child-material,  there  is  a  veri- 
table predestination.  These  considerations  are  at 
the  foundation  of  my  own  profound  concern  for 
what  is  now  being  called  organic  education,  — 
manual  training,  g3rmnastic,  music,  and  art,  —  for 

227 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

it  represents  a  form  of  upbuilding  both  of  the 
organism  and  of  the  human  spirit  which,  when 
taken  at  the  flood,  leads  on  to  the  good  for- 
tune of  an  accomplished  personality,  but  omit- 
ted, means  hfe-long  poverty.  This  registration  of 
habit  is  very  obvious  in  those  arts  and  dexterities 
which  need  the  trained  organ,  the  eye  and  hand, 
voice  and  ear.  It  is  less  obvious,  but  equally 
assured,  in  all  the  affairs  of  the  spirit,  for  these 
habits  are  also  firmly  registered  in  the  physical 
part  of  us.  As  Dr.  Carpenter  puts  the  case : 
^  Our  nervous  systems  have  grown  to  the  way  in 
which  they  have  been  exercised,  just  as  a  sheet 
of  paper  or  a  coat  once  creased  or  folded  tends 
to  fall  forever  afterwards  into  the  same  identical 
folds.' 

Illustrations  of  the  compelling  force  of  habit 
abound  on  all  sides.  We  know  the  ill-bred  man, 
whose  manners,  dress,  intonation,  point  of  view, 
ambitions,  morals  even,  offend  us  at  every  turn, 
who  is  perhaps  mortified  at  his  own  shortcomings, 
and  yet  can  no  more  help  them  than  can  the 
well-bred  man  his  graciousness.  We  know  that 
had  Flavins  been  anything  of  a  psychologist,  he 
never  would  have  been  obliged  to  ask  the  several 
trades  of  the  Roman  workmen,  for  we  all  carry 
the  signs  of  our  professions  about  with  us,  the 
mannerisms  of  the  teacher,  writer,  doctor,  priest, 
lawyer,  or  tradesman.    The  momentousness  of  it 

228 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

is,  that  when  we  elect  one  set  of  habits,  we  make 
another  set  forever  impossible.  Once  into  the 
teens,  and  it  is  hardly  worth  while  to  attempt  the 
violin ;  once  out  of  them,  the  piano.  The  work- 
ing impulses  of  hf  e  must  be  gathered  by  the  time 
one  is  forty.  Beyond  that  point,  one  may  con- 
cern one's  self  with  many  new  interests,  but  it  will 
always  be  more  or  less  from  the  outside. 

Looking  backward,  a  man  can  see  how  a  single 
bad  habit,  perhaps  an  ingrained  prejudice,  a  nar- 
row view  of  duty,  a  bit  of  congenital  obstinacy, 
has  kept  him  from  great  good ;  how  another 
habit,  some  openness  of  mind,  some  instilled 
generosity,  has  carried  him  to  the  very  gates  of 
heaven.  When  one  thinks  about  these  things, 
one  is  led  to  wish  that  there  may  be  some  truth 
in  reincarnation,  and  that  somewhere,  in  a  re- 
newed youth,  one  may  acquire  those  beneficent 
habits  too  feebly  grasped  in  the  present. 

But  one  must  not  dwell  too  hopelessly  upon 
personal  limitations.  Our  problem,  as  I  have 
said,  is  not  how  far  we  should  go  if  we  had  seven- 
league  boots,  but  how  far  we  are  actually  going  in 
our  present  factory-made  shoes.  It  is  rather  the 
brighter  side  of  habit  that  the  seeker  after  good 
fortune  must  needs  emphasize,  —  the  automatic 
goodness  of  life  in  place  of  the  automatic  bad- 
ness. And  there  are  truly  a  lot  of  rosy  things  to 
be  said.    To  quote  Professor  James  once  more : 

229 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

'  People  talk  of  the  smoking-habit  and  the  swear- 
ing-habit and  the  drinking-habit,  but  not  of  the 
abstention-habit  or  the  moderation-habit  or  the 
courage-habit.  But  the  fact  is  that  our  virtues 
are  habits  as  much  as  our  vices.  As  we  become 
permanent  drunkards  by  so  many  separate  drinks, 
so  we  become  saints  in  the  moral,  and  authorities 
and  experts  in  the  practical  and  scientific  spheres 
by  so  many  separate  acts  and  hours  of  work.' 

This  is  the  helpful  and  tonic  view.  One's  ner- 
vous system  can  be  made  into  one's  good  angel 
quite  as  readily  as  into  one's  devil. 

It  is  the  force  of  habit  that  saves  the  present 
moment.  One  would  become  a  precious  prig  if 
before  each  act,  however  trivial,  one  were  obliged 
to  pause  and  reflect,  obliged  to  remember  to 
do  what  is  right.  And  furthermore,  one  would 
never  get  anywhere.  Heaven  would  be  for  some 
more  nimble  fellow.  One  would  be  forever  at 
the  task  of  holding  on  to  what  little  virtue  one 
had  got,  but  any  progress  in  virtue  would  be  quite 
impossible. 

Happily,  none  of  us  is  condemned  to  such  a 
hopeless,  arid  task.  On  the  contrary,  each  ac- 
quired virtue  may  be  made  a  habit,  and  so  turned 
over  to  the  unconscious  and  automatic.  Just  as 
so  many  of  the  bodily  functions  have  been  given 
over  to  the  guardianship  of  the  subconscious  self, 
a  servitor  with  quarters  in  the  spinal  column  or 

230 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

somewhere  else,  so  the  intellectual  and  spiritual 
functions,  when  they  have  traced  out  for  them- 
selves sufficiently  well-defined  paths  in  the  ner- 
vous tissue,  may  be  banished  from  consciousness, 
—  in  fact,  betake  themselves  to  automatism  of 
their  own  accord,  —  and  the  attention  is  left  free 
to  concern  itself  with  new  conquests. 

It  is  a  curious  weakness  in  Kant's  system  of 
morals,  and  indeed  in  much  of  our  theological 
morality,  that  the  element  of  continued  effort  is 
so  much  insisted  upon.  We  must  do  the  right 
thing,  not  from  good  nature,  not  from  a  whole- 
some, rational  spirit,  but,  if  you  please,  from  a 
conscious  sense  of  duty,  indeed  against  the  natu- 
ral inclination,  or  the  act  has  no  moral  worth. 
This  is  most  disagreeable  doctrine,  and  quite 
unpsychological  into  the  bargain.  For  myself, 
I  should  much  prefer  that  you  would  be  decent 
to  me  because  you  wanted  to  be,  and  I  am  very 
sure  that  your  goodness  would  thereby  gain  con- 
siderable graciousness.  One  would  almost  choose 
to  be  wicked  and  be  sincere  about  it,  rather  than 
to  be  pseudo-good  in  this  hypocritical  fashion. 
It  is  fortunate  that  the  statement  is  the  thing 
at  fault,  and  that  goodness  itself  is  not  tainted 
with  any  such  hideous  necessity.  There  is  plenty 
of  room  for  effort  in  the  moral  life,  continuous, 
persistent,  strenuous  effort;  but  to  make  the 
life  progressive  and  worth  while,  the  effort  must 

231 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

be  applied  to  new  problems,  and  fresh  victories 
must  constantly  succeed  old  ones.  When  moral 
effort  stands  stubbornly  hitched  to  the  same  old 
problems,  life  takes  on  a  forbidding,  puritanical 
aspect,  and  heaven  is  pretty  far  off. 

Our  gains  in  automatic  goodness  have  added 
dignity  in  that  they  are  not  confined  to  the  indi- 
vidual; they  become  the  heritage  of  the  race. 
The  good  habit  persisted  in  long  enough  to  sink 
below  the  threshold  of  consciousness  and  become 
automatic  may  or  may  not  be  directly  trans- 
mitted to  the  next  generation,  but  in  any  case, 
it  becomes  a  part  of  that  good  expectation  into 
which  the  next  generation  is  born.  Other  things 
being  equal,  one  would  prefer  to  have  a  child 
educated  in  an  old  and  socially-minded  commu- 
nity like  New  England,  rather  than  in  districts 
less  well  organized  and  more  given  over  to  anar- 
chy, for  the  current  social  expectation  is  most 
important  in  its  influence  on  the  individual. 

We  ourselves  are  much  beholden  to  this  right- 
doing  in  the  past.  It  is  in  no  spirit  of  self-con- 
scious virtue  that  we  now  refrain  from  the  grosser 
immoralities,  from  the  nine  negations  of  the  deca- 
logue. It  is  our  good  fortune  that  a  long  line 
of  painstaking  ancestors  refrained  from  murder 
and  theft  and  the  bearing  of  false  witness  and 
the  committing  of  adultery  and  those  special  and 
obvious  forms  of  unrighteousness  which  appar- 

232 


DOCTRINE    OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

ently  the  ancient  Hebrews  were  especially  prone 
to,  since  they  had  to  be  commanded  so  explicitly 
to  refrain  from  them.  This  restraint  has  become 
in  us  a  habit,  and  it  is  a  matter  of  genuine 
surprise  to  us  that  people  should  want  to  kill 
and  steal  and  do  all  the  other  things  which  repel 
rather  than  attract  ourselves. 

Our  own  moral  struggle  is  no  less  real,  but  it 
has  been  transferred  to  distinctly  higher  grounds. 
The  conflict  now  is  more  subtle,  not  so  much  a 
fight  with  the  negations,  with  the  things  a  man 
must  not  do,  as  the  more  positive  fight  against 
what  we  may  call  the  immorality  of  the  second- 
best,  the  fight  not  to  do  the  thing  less  excellently 
than  we  are  capable  of  doing  it.  I  know  a  man 
who  paints  so  well  that  his  friends  wish  he  would 
paint  better.  And  I  suppose  that  all  of  us  who 
read  this  page  are  so  admirable  that  it 's  a  hea- 
ven's pity  we  are  not  more  admirable. 

I  do  not  mean  at  all  to  belittle  this  gracious 
vantage-ground.  It  is  a  great  gain  if  it  be  taken 
as  an  opportunity  rather  than  as  a  sedative. 
There  are  many  less-evolved  people  who  have  not 
got  so  far  as  this.  Mr.  Lumholz  tells  the  story 
of  an  Australian  planter  whose  native  servant, 
when  they  reached  a  narrow  path  in  the  jungle, 
begged  that  he  be  allowed  to  go  first,  lest  he 
be  tempted  to  kill  the  master.  The  newspapers 
every  day  record  a  similar  savagery  in  our  midst. 

233 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

A  lady  teaching  in  one  of  the  truant  schools  in 
New  York  City  recently  told  me  that  she  never 
dared  to  turn  her  back  to  the  class,  for  the  in- 
stinct to  throw  things  on  the  part  of  the  boys 
made  it  positively  unsafe. 

It  is  a  grave  reflection,  the  dreadful  things 
that  we  people  who  count  ourselves  somewhat 
civilized  might  still  be  doing  had  our  own  set 
of  habits  been  differently  organized.  And  it  is 
a  chastening  reflection,  the  thought  of  the  very 
unfavorable  light  in  which  much  of  our  present 
conduct  must  appear  from  the  point  of  view  of 
a  higher  existence. 

It  need  hardly  be  added  that  in  this  hymn 
to  the  good  goddess  of  habit  we  have  in  mind 
not  only  outer  acts,  but  still  more  the  making 
habitual  of  those  inner  states  from  which  the 
right  acts  flow,  the  feelings,  attitudes,  modes  of 
thought. 

But  the  great  point  is,  that  this  quest  of  the 
moral  life,  this  cultivation  of  the  set  of  habits 
which  represent  human  evolution  at  its  best,  need 
be  self-conscious  only  when  breaking  new  ground. 
It  is  quite  possible  to  wrap  up  each  moral  gain 
in  the  fibres  of  the  organism  itself.  The  minor 
moralities  may  be  disposed  of,  one  by  one,  quite 
as  completely  as  the  more  obvious  moralities  with 
which  our  ancestors  struggled.  It  is  no  longer 
necessary  to  remember  to  breathe,  or  to  balance 

234 


DOCTRINE    OF    AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

one's  self  in  standing  and  walking.  The  average 
man  has  no  temptation  either  to  kill  or  to  steal. 
So  the  time  is  surely  coming  when  we  shall  have 
made  a  habit  of  justice  and  of  charity. 

The  daily  right-doing  in  the  way  of  food  and 
drink  and  personal  hygiene  and  manner  of 
thought  and  way  of  talk  and  all  the  rest  may 
be  made  quite  automatic,  and  the  conscious  part 
of  the  man,  his  real  life,  left  free  for  higher 
endeavors.  However  many  victories  we  may  win, 
we  shall  never  have  occasion,  in  this  incarnation 
at  least,  to  shed  the  tears  of  Alexander.  The 
moral  life  is  a  life  of  continuous  effort,  but  it  is 
effort  applied  continuously  to  new  objects. 

By  thus  building  up  a  magnificent  moral  back- 
ground, a  background  of  assured  social  habit,  of 
good  breeding  in  the  largest  sense  of  that  term, 
the  objects  of  immediate  conscious  striving  need 
not  at  any  one  time  be  sufficiently  great  to 
confuse  the  seeker  after  good  fortune,  or  to 
interfere  with  wholesome  living  in  the  present 
moment,  which  is,  after  all,  the  highest  manifes- 
tation of  morality. 

I  am  disposed  to  go  one  step  further,  and  to 
believe  that  the  very  habit  of  striving  may  itself 
be  made  automatic,  and  may  pass  quite  out  of 
consciousness,  for  I  have  met  these  serene  spirits, 
men  and  women  of  the  radiant  life,  who  have 
about  them  the  quiet,  unconscious  habit  of  suc- 

235 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

cess.  The  quest  of  the  larger  life  has  become  in 
them  the  quest  of  excellence  in  all  things,  a  fixed 
habit  of  heart  and  mind.  They  have  become  once 
more  simple-minded  and  spontaneous,  for  they 
have  carried  knowledge  beyond  the  point  of  mere 
sophistication  to  the  point  of  character.  And 
when  the  illumination  has  accomplished  this,  it 
has  accomplished  its  perfect  work.  The  world  of 
effort  is  now  old  enough  for  man  to  allow  him- 
self some  taste  of  this  realization,  to  enter,  since 
he  is  bidden,  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  For 
the  kingdom  of  heaven,  be  it  remembered,  is 
eternally  within. 

Such  in  outline  is  the  doctrine  of  automatic 
goodness. 

I  am  suitably  aware  that  there  is  here  presented 
little  that  is  new.  The  doctrine  of  automatic 
goodness,  of  the  ingrained  goodness  which  is  ours 
or  is  not  ours  through  the  available  force  of  habit, 
is  only  a  special  statement  of  the  great  process 
of  human  evolution  ;  is  only  a  modern  dress  for 
the  old  Pauline  doctrine  of  growing  in  grace ; 
is  only  a  partial  rendering  of  the  sublime  Bud- 
dhist discipline  of  the  Path. 

It  is  a  commonplace  of  philosophy,  at  least 
since  the  time  of  Kant,  that  nature  is  not  a  fixed 
experience,  but  that  her  content  and  significance, 
the  essential  part  of  her,  depend  upon  the  qualities 
of  the  perceiving  mind.    Each  soul,  through  the 


DOCTRINE   OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

activity  of  the  understanding,  creates  its  own 
world.  Happy  the  soul  that  by  contact  with  great 
thoughts  learns  what  it  is  that  makes  a  world 
fair,  and  by  its  OT^n  activity  in  the  organization 
and  extension  of  habit  enters  into  this  good 
fortune. 

The  cult  of  automatic  goodness  has  never  been 
without  earnest  practitioners,  —  Be  ye  therefore 
perfect,  even  as  God  is  perfect.  It  is  too  simple 
a  scheme  of  salvation  to  be  much  in  favor  with 
dogmatic  theology,  but,  nevertheless,  it  is  the 
practical  side  of  all  true  religion,  the  making 
habitual  of  all  that  is  profoundly  desirable  in 
human  life. 

An  interesting  and  in  some  respects  a  curious 
outbreak  of  the  cult  is  now  making  its  appear- 
ance in  various  quarters  of  the  world.  It  has 
come  with  the  force  of  a  discovery,  and  has  been 
named  most  inappropriately  the  New'  Thought. 
I  recently  received  a  copy  of  a  little  journal, 
published  in  some  obscure  corner,  which  contains, 
in  addition  to  its  own  special  propaganda,  the 
advertisements  of  a  score  or  more  of  books  and 
periodicals,  hailing  from  all  sections  of  the  coun- 
try and  proposing  the  attainment  of  all  sorts  of 
human  good,  —  of  health,  of  worldly  prosperity, 
of  the  serene  spirit.  The  method  is  in  all  cases 
the  same,  —  the  making  habitual  of  certain  help- 
ful attitudes  of  mind. 

237 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

With  some  pleasant  exceptions,  the  literature 
of  the  New  Thought  has  a  tendency  to  offend 
both  one's  literary  instincts  and  one's  sense  of 
financial  decency.  Too  much  of  it  seems  to  have 
for  its  major  motive  the  disposition  of  very 
cheaply  got-up  books  at  very  high  prices.  It  is 
v^ell  to  acknowledge  all  this  with  perfect  frank- 
ness, for  in  spite  of  it,  the  movement  deserves 
serious  attention  and  respect.  The  vulgarisms 
will  drop  off,  and  the  thinly  disguised  bid  for 
money-profit  will  be  discredited.  The  underlying 
truth  remains.  Salvation  is  a  matter  of  individ- 
ual effort,  and  it  does  consist,  not  in  dallying 
with  temptations  and  the  undesirable,  but  in 
steadfastly  wrapping  up  in  one's  very  organism 
those  habits  of  conduct  and  tendencies  to  be- 
havior which  are  distinctly  good. 

It  may  seem  like  bringing  much  into  one  net 
to  point  out  that  that  part  of  the  movement 
known  as  Christian  Science  which  is  sound  and 
defensible  falls  into  precisely  the  same  cate- 
gory, —  the  organization  of  a  certain  set  of  hab- 
its, —  and  is  much  less  modern  and  unique  than 
is  commonly  supposed.  In  tilting  against  such 
established  disagreeables  as  sin,  sickness,  and 
death,  this  aspect  of  the  New  Thought  has  cer- 
tainly set  itself  a  pretty  stiff  task.  The  discipline 
of  time  will  doubtless  correct  the  aims  and  atti- 
tude of  the  whole  movement.    It  is  reasonable 

238 


DOCTRINE   OF   AUTOMATIC    GOODNESS 

to  believe  that  Christian  Science  will  some  day 
throw  off  its  exclusive  claim  to  the  narrow  path, 
will  gladly  acknowledge  its  kinship  with  the 
world-effort  after  righteousness,  will  mix  with 
its  excessive  subjectivity  such  objective  practice 
as  the  doctrine  of  cause  and  effect  teaches,  and 
will  so  attract  to  itself  the  undivided  sympathy 
of  more  careful  thinkers. 

Experience  justifies  an  entire  faith  in  our 
ability  to  make  automatic  the  habits  of  good 
health  and  wholesome  well-being,  the  serene 
mind  and  lofty  ideal.  In  spite  of  all  that  is 
hideous  in  our  modern  life,  we  are  beginning  to 
realize  what  habits  make  for  good  fortune  and 
welfare,  and  are  beginning  to  cultivate  them. 
Better  medicine  than  any  ever  prescribed  by 
physician  is  the  simple  conviction  that  in  place 
of  asking  sympathy  for  illness,  a  man  ought  to 
be  heartily  ashamed  of  himself  for  the  lack  of 
practical  intelligence  which  illness  denotes.  It  is 
the  same  in  the  more  subtle  matters  of  the  spirit. 
Happiness  is  an  attitude  of  mind,  and  so  are 
love  and  charity  and  justice  and  all  the  cardi- 
nal and  minor  virtues,  and  they  are  as  open  to 
cultivation  as  flowers  in  a  garden.  One  must 
first  believe  that  they  are  worth  cultivating, 
and  then  proceed  to  the  task  by  making  habit- 
ual both  the  good  and  the  search  for  the  good. 
Finally,  to  escape  that  moral  preoccupation  which 

239 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

means  entire  defeat,  one  must  see  that  the  good 
habits  become  automatic,  in  order  that  one  may 
be  free  both  for  the  tasks  of  a  larger  goodness 
and  the  opportunities  of  present  comradeship. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  the  postponement  of 
attainment,  of  present  reaHzation,  of  happiness, 
of  helpful  fellowship,  also  becomes  habitual. 
Through  excess  of  preparation,  an  obstructing 
self-consciousness,  one  may  fail  in  the  real  art  of 
living.  Each  day  lost  to  sincerity  increases  the 
probability  that  to-morrow  will  also  be  lost.  It 
is  the  high  office  of  habit,  and  especially  of  habit 
grown  automatic,  to  clear  the  ground  and  save 
the  present  moment. 


XI 

SOCIAL  WELFARE 

INDIVIDUAL  good  fortune  becomes  a  curi- 
ously fantastic  thing  when  unchastened  by 
that  larger  view  of  life,  the  idea  of  social  welfare. 
It  is  not,  as  commonly  supposed,  good  fortune 
at  the  expense  of  welfare.  The  defect  is  in  the 
fortune  itself,  a  defect  which  is  brought  to  light 
only  when  the  test  of  welfare  is  applied.  And 
it  is  this  defect  in  the  individual  destiny  which 
constitutes  the  defect  in  the  social  welfare.  But 
this  is  only  to  say  once  more  that  there  is  essen- 
tially no  conflict  between  intelHgent  egoism  and 
intelligent  altruism ;  that  there  can  be  no  dis- 
cernible welfare  in  a  group  of  men  which  is  not 
possessed  by  the  individual  components  of  the 
group. 

The  failure  to  make  good  fortune  square  with 
social  welfare  is  responsible  for  a  large  part  of 
the  abundant  criticism  which  has  been  hurled 
against  the  setting  up  of  individual  good  fortune, 
or  personal  happiness,  as  the  goal  of  the  moral 
life.  But  this  criticism,  as  I  have  been  attempt- 
ing with  so  much  iteration  to  point  out,  is  in 
reality  not  directed  against  genuine  good  for- 

241 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

tune,  genuine  happiness,  but  against  so  false  a 
substitute  that,  if  attained,  it  would  be  indi- 
vidual disaster  rather  than  individual  good  for- 
tune. Many  of  the  ends  of  conduct  proposed  by 
individual  fortune-hunters,  and  actually  attained, 
are  eminently  unsocial,  but  no  one  has  been 
able  to  show  that  such  ends  contributed  to  the 
genuine  well-being  of  the  individual  himself. 
On  the  contrary,  all  informed  opinion  unites  in 
pitying  the  concrete  evil-doer,  the  individual, 
rather  than  the  abstract  sufPerer,  the  public. 
Even  if  the  offense  be  so  venial  that  the  destiny 
of  the  wrong-doer  remain  outwardly  tolerable, 
or  even  apparently  desirable  to  persons  still  less 
fortunate,  it  can  be  shown  in  every  case  that 
such  a  destiny  is  at  least  a  failure  in  this,  that 
the  larger  measure  of  happiness,  the  truer  good 
fortune,  is  necessarily  and  completely  unrealized. 
Since  all  values  are  relative,  the  thing  that  is 
may  be  a  genuine  disaster  when  compared  with 
the  more  ideal  thing,  the  thing  that  might  have 
been. 

The  purpose  in  once  more  reviewing  this  opti- 
mistic and  disciplinary  view  of  wrong-doing  is 
to  point  out  that  just  as  individual  good  fortune 
becomes  unsound  and  fantastic  apart  from  the 
idea  of  welfare,  so  the  conception  of  social  wel- 
fare becomes  inverted  and  tyrannous  just  as  soon 
as  it  fails  to  square  most  rigidly  with  the  ideas  of 

242 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


personal  good  fortune  and  individual  happiness. 
From  the  very  nature  of  the  case,  it  could  not  be 
otherwise.  If  the  single  drops  of  water  be  robbed 
of  weight,  the  whole  ocean  ceases  to  weigh  any- 
thing. No  sum  can  be  made  up  out  of  genuine 
zeros. 

Those  who  have  discarded  the  grotesque  fancy 
that  represents  society  as  a  distinct  organism 
with  a  destiny  and  welfare  different  in  kind 
from  the  destiny  and  welfare  of  its  component 
men,  women,  and  children,  discard  with  it  the 
impossible  thought  that  the  public  good  is  some- 
thing separate  from  the  private  good.  If  I  and 
my  neighbors  be  unhappy,  it  is  altogether  futile 
to  assure  us  that  the  social  welfare  is  nevertheless 
all  right.  We  have  contrary  proof  in  our  own 
private  grief.  I  propose  to  apply  this  test  of 
personal  well-being  in  judging  the  reputed  pros- 
perity of  a  country  which  claims  with  reason  to 
be  the  greatest  and  most  powerful  country  of 
modern  times.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  this 
country  is  America. 

In  applying  such  a  test,  the  on-looker  may 
properly  object  that  no  one  man,  however  keen 
his  social  instinct,  however  indefatigable  a  trav- 
eler he  may  be,  however  wide  a  reader,  how- 
ever varied  a  worker  and  thoroughgoing  an 
experimentalist,  —  that  no  one  man,  whatever  his 
equipment,  can   accurately   measure  so  large  a 

243 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

thing  as  the  personal  well-being  of  eighty  million 
people.  The  objection  is  quite  sound,  but  the 
measurement,  it  seems,  has  already  been  made 
for  us.  We  can  all  read  for  ourselves,  and  from 
a  score  or  more  of  records.  We  might,  for  ex- 
ample, select  our  architecture  as  being  a  quite 
infalHble  guide  to  the  sentiment  of  the  people. 
It  is  a  guide  because  it  expresses  most  practically 
our  ideas  of  domestic  comfort  and  public  dignity. 
And  though  not  a  flattering  guide,  it  is  eminently 
trustworthy  because  devoid  of  any  such  ulterior 
motive  as  serving  for  a  social  standard.  Or  we 
might  select  any  other  unsophisticated  witness,  — 
the  stage,  the  pulpit,  the  school,  the  highways, 
the  water  fronts,  dress,  sign-boards,  the  markets, 
railway  service.  All  these  reflect  American  life, 
and  proclaim  its  quality.  But  I  mean  to  select  a 
still  better  measuring-rod,  one  that  unites  in  pre- 
sentation and  deliberate  comment  all  these  various 
expressions  of  the  national  feeling,  and  does  it 
more  completely  than  any  other  single  witness, 
—  the  newspaper. 

Whatever  our  feeling  for  the  newspaper,  or 
against  it,  we  must  admit  that  it  has  attracted 
to  its  service  some  of  the  brightest  minds  of  the 
day,  and  that  no  better  English  is  being  put  into 
print  than  can  be  found  in  the  editorial  columns 
of  the  better  papers.  Furthermore,  it  must  be 
admitted  that  whatever  the  minority  opinion  may 

244 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


be,  the  verdict  of  the  majority  unequivocally 
pronounces  the  present  to  be  highly  prosperous 
times.  It  seems  fair,  therefore,  to  regard  the 
newspaper  as  a  mirror  not  only  of  our  national 
life,  but  also  of  our  national  prosperity.  And 
what  image  does  the  newspaper  disclose  ? 

For  some  months  past  I  have  been  making 
such  a  deliberate  study  of  the  newspaper,  reading 
it  every  day,  except  Sunday,  and  sometimes  both 
morning  and  evening.  And  I  have  chosen,  not 
the  journals  of  doubtful  reputation,  but  the  best 
put  forth  by  our  very  respectable  and  very  civil- 
ized city  of  Boston.  The  general  effect  of  this 
daily  reading  of  newspapers  is  to  discourage 
optimism.  The  prosperity  which  one  expected 
to  find  reflected  column  after  column  turns  out  to 
be  doubtful  or  more  than  doubtful.  Let  us  take 
this  particular  morning  as  a  concrete  instance, 
since  the  news  is  largely  national  and  local.  It 
is  Monday  morning,  and  one  would  expect  some- 
thing of  the  world  a  little  better  than  the  aver- 
age, since  the  weather  of  late  has  been  good  and 
yesterday  was  a  rest-day.  On  the  first  page  one 
reads  an  account  of  the  arrest  of  two  men 
charged  with  murder ;  the  assault  and  robbery  of 
two  men  in  Lynn ;  the  shooting  of  a  man  in 
Maine  ;  the  arrest  of  a  millionaire  swindler  in  New 
York ;  the  probability  of  a  large  strike  among 
the  mill  hands  at  Lowell;  the  investigation  of 

245 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

election  frauds  in  Boston ;  the  shooting  of  a  girl 
by  her  lover  down  in  Providence.  The  other 
pages,  though  not  devoid  of  murder  and  assault, 
are  less  given  over  to  deeds  of  violence.  As  it  is 
Monday,  one  page  is  devoted  to  sermons,  of  which 
it  cannot  be  said  that  all  are  in  taste,  since  the 
names  of  at  least  two  private  persons  still  living 
are  used  to  point  a  moral.  The  editorial  page  is 
more  cheery,  though  even  here  one  reads  sepa- 
rate articles  on  doubtful  evidence  ;  industrial  dis- 
turbances ;  injunctions ;  the  degradation  of  a 
great  city  ;  a  United  States  Senator  who  is  unable 
to  grasp  economic  questions,  and  the  continued 
wrong-doing  of  Pennsylvania.  Then  follows  a 
long  article  on  national  affairs,  in  which  it  is 
stated  that  ^  there  is  no  more  misleading,  deceiv- 
ing, wholly  selfish  mental  atmosphere  in  the 
country  than  that  of  Washington,'  —  which  is 
miaking  things  rather  bad  at  the  centre.  There 
is  much  else  in  the  paper  that  is  non-committal, 
or  even  meritorious,  such  as  the  acquisition  of  a 
famous  picture  by  the  Museum,  but  taking  the 
whole  twelve  pages,  one  is  shocked  to  find  that 
the  major  part  of  the  news  is  news  of  violence 
and  disorder, — burglary,  arson,  murder,  window- 
smashing,  strikes,  assaults,  municipal  corruption, 
street-shooting,  and  the  like. 

Such  is  the  picture  of  our  prosperity  as  pre- 
sented by  the  newspaper.    And  it  must  be  re- 

246 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


membered  that  I  am  writing  in  what  every  one 
concedes  to  be  very  prosperous  times,  on  the 
very  day,  indeed,  when  one  of  our  industrial 
monopolies  writes  out  a  quarterly  dividend  of 
eight  millions  for  one  shareholder  and  three 
millions  for  another.  It  cannot  be  said  that  this 
picture  of  American  manners  and  morals  pre- 
sents either  social  welfare  or  individual  hap- 
piness. Nor  can  one  doubt  the  trustworthiness 
of  the  picture,  since  it  comes  to  us  at  first 
hand. 

Coming  back  now  from  this  not  very  encour- 
aging excursion  into  the  concrete  to  a  more 
abstract  and  general  treatment,  it  must  be  re- 
membered that  the  test  of  prosperity,  of  social 
welfare,  is  a  definite  and  ascertainable  standard. 
The  community  which  fails  of  human  happiness 
cannot  boast  of  social  welfare.  Prosperity,  to  be 
genuine,  must  be  vouched  for,  not  by  well-fed 
and  comfortable  on-lookers,  not  by  partisan  news- 
papers, not  by  demagogues  bent  on  flattering 
the  mass  of  voters,  not  even  by  the  outcry  of 
the  multitude,  but  by  something  much  more  fun- 
damental, —  by  the  happiness  of  myself  and 
neighbors.  And  this  happiness  of  ours  depends 
upon  our  human  wealth,  —  our  health  and  beauty 
and  accomplishment,  —  upon  the  ideality  of  our 
relations  with  other  persons,  upon  the  charm  and 
wholesomeness  of   our  surroundings,  upon   the 

247 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

significance  and  reasonableness  of  our  daily  toil, 
upon  the  satisfactions  of  our  leisure  hours,  upon 
the  reverence  of  our  intercourse  with  the  unseen, 
upon  our  attitude  towards  life  generally. 

All  who  work  for  the  furtherance  of  social 
welfare  doubtless  work  in  a  vague  way  for  just 
these  ends.  Certainly  no  one  would  deny  them. 
All  friends  of  civilization  mean  eventually  to  get 
around  to  persons.  But  meanwhile,  the  direct 
concern  of  the  majority  is  for  things,  for  the 
things  which  they  imagine  ought  to  mean  good 
fortune  for  the  individual.  This  is  the  fatal 
defect  in  much  of  our  public  activity,  in  our  phi- 
lanthropy, in  our  legislation,  in  our  attempts  at 
neighborliness,  in  our  dealings  with  our  own 
family,  even  with  ourselves.  It  is  the  radical 
defect  in  the  social  part  of  our  morality.  What, 
for  example,  is  the  common  acceptation  of  the 
attractive  term,  ^  good  times '  ?  Does  it  mean  that 
the  national  life  is  marked  by  a  sound  happi- 
ness ;  that  our  men  and  women  and  children 
are  beautiful,  lovable  persons ;  that  there  has 
just  been  some  promising  advance  in  education  ; 
that  a  magnificent  picture  has  been  painted, 
a  noble  symphony  composed,  a  great  book  writ- 
ten ;  that  our  cities  and  suburbs  and  farmyards 
have  thrown  off  their  squalor  and  put  on  beauty; 
that  religion  has  received  widespread  application 
in  the  affairs  of  daily  life  ;  that  the  nation  has 

248 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


surpassed  other  nations  in  justice  and  magnan- 
imity ;  that  America  has  been  quickened  and 
inspired  along  the  line  of  a  more  godlike  emo- 
tion and  thought  and  deed,  expanded  in  effi- 
ciency and  worth  ?  So  promising  a  situation  as 
this  would  surely  deserve  to  be  called  '  good 
times.'  But  it  seems  that  the  term,  for  all  its 
pleasant  sound,  means  nothing  so  delightful  and 
human  as  this.  What  it  does  mean  is  an  expan- 
sive state  of  the  financial  mind,  stocks  booming, 
profits  large,  wages  tolerable,  men  and  women 
and  even  children  working  long  hours  in  fac- 
tory, mill,  and  mine,  —  in  a  word,  tremendous 
human  fatigue.  It  means  unrest  and  excitement, 
with  a  curious  inflation  of  values.  It  means  so 
many  miles  of  railroad  built,  such  and  such 
gross  tonnage  at  our  several  ports,  so  much 
manipulation  of  products.  It  means  this  and 
much  else,  but  all  of  it  material,  all  measured  in 
terms  of  things,  big  performance  in  wood  and 
metal,  brick  and  stone,  with  that  sentimental 
trifle,  human  happiness,  not  counted  in. 

One  who  is  not  blinded  by  the  excitement  of 
the  game  cannot  look  soberly  upon  such  a  mani- 
festation of  national  life  and  call  it  good.  Nor 
can  one  call  the  times  which  produce  it  good. 
Our  fears  may  be  temporarily  hushed  by  the 
spectacle  of  so  much  wealth,  the  prospect  of  such 
unlimited  and  meaningless  toil,  the  assurance  of 

249 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

a  continuance  of  physical  life,  the  holding  of  a 
ticket,  probably  blank,  in  the  industrial  lottery. 
But  the  heart  is  not  satisfied.  The  better  part 
of  the  man  is  not  fed  and  nourished.  In  the  real 
things  of  life  there  is  widespread  poverty,  in 
spite  of  this  cheery  cry  of  good  times.  Even  if 
one  accepted  this  sort  of  prosperity,  and  gloried 
in  it,  there  remains  the  unavoidable  reflection 
that,  as  a  matter  of  statistical  certainty,  the  times 
to-morrow  will  be  bad.  Social  welfare,  resting 
on  the  sole  foundation  of  things,  seems  destined 
to  this  perpetual  see-saw,  plenty  and  drought, 
drought  and  plenty,  but  in  neither  case  any 
great  show  of  happiness. 

Familiarity  with  social  wretchedness  breeds  a 
certain  indifference.  The  absence  of  happiness  is 
accepted  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  is  even  jus- 
tified by  morbid  and  sickly  souls  as  inevitable 
and  salutary.  But,  the  scales  once  fallen  from 
our  eyes,  we  shall  blush  for  our  indifference. 
Social  welfare,  unchastened  by  the  idea  of  indi- 
vidual good  fortune,  is  a  hideous  thing,  and 
opens  the  door  to  as  many  mischiefs  as  the  most 
unbridled  self-indulgence  of  individuals.  The 
offenders  are  also  individuals,  and  must  be  indi- 
viduals, since  these  alone  are  capable  of  action, 
but  they  are  individuals  under  the  dominance  of 
a  false  idea,  and  upheld  by  an  uninstructed  pub- 
lic opinion.    So  long  as  we  all  hold  to  the  fallacy 

250 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


that  prosperity  is  impersonal  and  material  instead 
of  being  personal  and  spiritual,  is  a  wealth  in 
things  instead  of  a  wealth  in  persons,  we  shall 
go  on  consenting  to  the  sacrifice  of  individuals, 
to  our  own  sacrifice  if  we  have  not  the  wit  to 
resist,  for  we  shall  all  want  this  so-called  pros- 
perity to  continue.  On  all  sides  one  sees  this 
sacrifice,  this  virtual  suicide  from  the  point  of 
view  of  the  individual,  this  virtual  murder  from 
the  point  of  view  of  society.  But  the  popular 
verdict  is  not  so  clarifying.  It  has  things  in 
mind,  not  persons,  and  declares  that  the  victim 
died  at  his  post,  died  at  his  post  of  duty,  —  the 
man  who  esteemed  the  bookkeeping  of  some 
altogether  unimportant  and  unnecessary  firm  or 
corporation  more  sacred  than  his  own  health  and 
life ;  the  factory  worker  who  chose  poison  and 
wages  in  place  of  wholesome  outdoor  life  on  his 
own  initiative;  the  Tommy  Atkins  who  played 
soldier  and  let  himself  be  shot  in  some  commer- 
cial war  or  debt-collecting  enterprise  in  the  trop- 
ics ;  the  whole  army  of  persons  laying  down  their 
health  and  sanity  and  life  on  the  altar  of  things, 
in  the  service  of  false  causes. 

It  is  our  too  great  familiarity  with  this  tragedy 
of  the  milHons  that  makes  us  indifferent.  But 
there  come  moments  of  keener  moral  vision. 
After  a  wholesome  summer  in  the  open,  the  re- 
turn to  town  means  for  sensitive  souls  a  distinct 

251 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

illness,  a  species  of  acclimatization  fever  brought 
on  not  alone  by  the  bad  air  and  bad  smell  of  the 
city,  but  still  more  by  the  spectacle  of  human 
misery  that  one  sees  on  all  sides,  —  human  misery 
and  degradation,  the  wan,  pinched  faces  of  tired 
men  and  women  and  children,  the  pathetic  droop 
of  the  shoulders,  the  suffering  eyes.  Or,  if  one 
be  so  fortunate  as  to  live  in  the  country  among 
more  agreeable  sights  and  sounds,  the  occasional 
journey  to  town,  if  it  take  place  during  the  so- 
called  '  rush  hours,'  and  especially  the  night 
rush  hours,  when  the  burden  and  heat  of  the 
hard  day  have  left  their  tragic  impress  on  the 
faces  of  the  workers,  even  this  passing  contact 
produces  a  spiritual  heart-failure,  and  makes  one 
wonder  how  anything  so  desirable  as  social  wel- 
fare can  be  gained  from  such  evident  personal 
poverty.  And  on  a  holiday,  as  we  all  know, 
gentler  folk  keep  their  children  and  womenkind 
at  home,  for  they  like  neither  the  manners  nor 
the  morals  of  the  multitude. 

These  are  not  agreeable  pictures,  and  there 
are  many  comfortable  and  well-to-do  persons 
who  not  only  shut  their  eyes  very  tight  to  them, 
but  feel  an  open  impatience  with  those  who  de- 
cline to  do  the  same.  This  established  order,  so 
full  of  comfort  and  luxury  and  play  for  the 
profit-takers,  has  been  incorporated  by  many 
with  the  thirty-nine  articles,  and  made  an  object 

252 


^     OF  THE 

UNIVERSI 
SOCIAL   WELFARE  " 

of  almost  religious  belief.  It  becomes  profane 
to  question  the  beneficence  of  a  regime  which 
means  the  piling-up  of  material  wealth  at  the 
cost  of  human  health  and  honor  and  happiness 
and  life,  for  this  material  wealth,  this  big  per- 
formance in  things,  is  the  accredited  symbol  of 
prosperity,  of  '  good  times,*  of  social  welfare. 

This  sort  of  brute  prosperity,  material  achieve-, 
ment  at  the  price  of  human  well-being,  rests  upon 
an  idea,  and  can  be  reformed  and  humanized 
only  by  recasting  the  idea.  The  present  indus- 
trial world,  with  its  vast  equipment  of  things, 
with  its  apparatus  costing  a  hundred  times  more 
than  the  habitations  and  personal  equipment  of 
the  human  workers,  seems  well  intrenched.  But 
it  is  held  together  by  something  at  once  more 
powerful  and  more  easily  dissolved  than  nails  and 
cement  and  tie-rods,  —  it  is  held  together  by  the 
consenting  idea.  Once  withdraw  this  consent, 
and  the  fabric  vanishes. 

Many  proposed  recastings  of  the  welfare  idea 
have  been  thrown  aside  by  the  practical  world  as 
idle  sentiment,  the  tiresome  vagaries  of  dreamers, 
and  some  of  these  recastings,  despite  their  good 
intention,  have  deserved  precisely  such  a  fate. 
But  the  judgment  of  morality,  the  impartial,  bal- 
anced, unemotional  measuring-rod  of  human  con- 
duct, may  not  be  disposed  of  in  this  way.  And 
morality,  as  we  have  seen,  is  the  compound  of 

253 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

efficiency  and  worth,  the  successful  adjustment 
of  human  activity  to  the  attainment  of  an  individ- 
ual good  fortune,  a  personal  happiness  so  gen- 
uine and  universal  as  to  deserve  collectively  the 
name  of  social  welfare. 

Prosperity,  as  commonly  conceived,  is  an  out- 
and-out  denial  of  morality,  for  it  is  not  expressed 
in  the  essential  moral  terms.  It  is  not  expressed 
in  terms  of  human  emotion,  of  genuine  welfare, 
but  in  the  impossible  terms  of  accumulation. 
The  things  which  now  represent  prosperity  can- 
not logically  represent  it,  for  at  best  they  are 
only  means,  and  cannot  by  any  sophism  be  made 
to  figure  as  ends.  It  takes  only  a  little  reflec- 
tion to  perceive  the  impossibility  of  the  standard. 
If  our  wealth  of  things  were  so  distributed,  and 
possessed  the  necessary  utility  and  beauty  to  make 
our  people  really  happy,  then  the  things  them- 
selves might  stand  as  the  outward  symbols  of 
this  inner  contentment.  But  the  most  unob- 
servant of  us  know  that  this  is  not  the  present 
state  of  affairs.  We  know  very  well  that  the  ma- 
jority of  the  things  produced  are  not  beautiful, 
not  even  useful,  that  the  tenure  of  possession  is 
precarious  even  for  those  financially  on  top,  that 
investments  are  roses  with  very  large  thorns  to 
them,  that  distribution  does  not  follow  a  moral 
formula,  that  most  of  our  people  lead  a  hand-to- 
mouth  existence  in  hired  tenements  so  squalid 

254 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


and  repulsive  that  they  might  fitly  be  the  sym- 
bol of  unhappiness.  Still  more  to  the  point,  we 
all  know  that  a  wealth  of  things  may  go  along 
with  happiness,  but  does  not  produce  it.  Our 
so-called  wealthy  persons,  as  a  class,  are  not  par- 
ticularly happy  persons.  Genuine  good  fortune 
demands  as  a  basis  the  material  possessions  essen- 
tial to  health  and  comfort,  but  it  is  primarily  an 
attitude  of  mind,  something  better  served  by 
human  wealth  —  strength  and  beauty  and  accom- 
plishment and  goodness  —  than  by  any  amount 
of  accumulated  things. 

The  current  idea  of  prosperity  being  quite 
untenable  and  indefensible,  it  remains  for  moral- 
ity to  point  out  the  truer  welfare,  and  to  indicate 
a  practical  method  by  which  it  may  be  gained. 
If  we  accept  the  moral  idea  of  welfare  already 
suggested,  the  idea  which  makes  prosperity  per- 
sonal and  human  rather  than  impersonal  and 
material,  the  idea  that  the  public  good  consists 
in  nothing  more  occult  than  individual  good  for- 
tune so  chastened  and  informed  as  to  be  genuine 
happiness,  then  it  is  very  clear  that  the  moral 
pursuit  of  social  welfare,  of  prosperity,  is  first 
and  last  and  always  the  pursuit  of  human  wealth. 
Social  welfare  is  not  a  fixed  goal.  It  is  a  process, 
the  making  a  human  world  more  human.  Let 
our  people  once  lay  firm  hold  upon  the  idea  that 
life  is  the  sacred  possession,  the  perfecting  of 

255 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

life  the  real  wealth,  and  that  false  idea  of  pros- 
perity which  we  as  a  nation  are  now  following, 
the  false  idea  which  leads  to  our  present  violence 
and  disorder,  becomes  at  once  impossible,  and 
the  new  and  better  day  has  dawned. 

It  is  both  unprofitable  and  unjust  to  hold  any 
one  class,  or  any  institution,  or  any  industrial 
combination,  or  any  aspect  of  legislation,  respon- 
sible for  the  immense  human  disaster  which  is 
to-day  the  portion  of  the  great  majority  of  our 
people.  The  exploiters  and  the  exploited  both 
consent  to  the  idea.  In  reality,  they  are  prison- 
ers of  the  same  false  standard ;  each  man  is  his 
own  jailer.  Emancipation  cannot  come  by  any 
general  proclamation.  The  work  of  liberation 
must  be  individual,  must  come  as  a  personal  sal- 
vation. It  is  only  one  by  one  that  we  can  enter 
the  kingdom  of  heaven.  The  kingdom  may  not 
be  taken  by  violence.  We  may  not  proclaim  it 
as  the  result  of  a  mass  meeting.  The  matters 
of  real  concern  in  America  to-day  are  those 
quiet  forces  which  are  at  work  changing  men's 
ideas.  Each  one  of  us  who  discovers  in  what  gen- 
uine good  fortune  consists,  and  is  faithful  to  the 
vision,  has  done  his  utmost  in  promoting  social 
welfare. 

Yet  there  is  much  corporate  action  in  which 
man  appears  to  operate  impersonally.  In  legisla- 
tion, in  domestic  matters,  in  teaching,  in  working, 

256 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


in  the  mite  which  each  contributes  to  public 
opinion,  we  are  called  upon  to  satisfy  the  demands 
of  a  general  welfare  rather  than  of  an  individual 
good  fortune.  But  however  much  obscured,  the 
old  moral  requirements  remain  inviolate.  Social 
welfare  is  a  meaningless  term  unless  expressed  as 
individual  good  fortune,  and  no  fortune  is  good 
unless  it  be  individual  and  self -chosen.  We  make 
a  sad  mess  of  it  in  our  corporate  action  when  we 
neglect  either  one  of  these  seemingly  difficult 
conditions.  We  have  seen  how  great  the  disas- 
ter is  when  we  omit  human  happiness,  and  it  is 
equally  great  when  we  try  to  make  others  happy 
according  to  our  own  notions  of  happiness.  As 
Miss  Etchingham  remarks,  people  are  amused  only 
by  what  amuses  them.  So  we  must  always  be 
harking  back  to  the  salutary  restraint  of  the 
Prologue,  that  people  are  satisfied  only  by  what 
satisfies  them.  But  just  as  it  is  darkest  before 
the  dawn,  so  the  very  confusion  and  tangle  of 
this  situation  prepares  the  solution,  —  there  is 
only  one  path  to  social  welfare,  and  that  is  the 
liberation  of  the  individual  to  work  out  his  own 
good  fortune,  unhampered  by  any  one,  unhamper- 
ing  any  one. 

In  a  word,  the  cardinal  virtue  of  society,  the 
essential  condition  of  welfare,  is  Freedom, 

No  body  of  men,  whether  grave  senators  or 
hilarious   representatives,    sober    churchmen   or 

257 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

learned  schoolmasters,  can  specify  my  good  for- 
tune, can  bring  it  to  me  ready  made,  can  bestow 
it  upon  me,  or  can  keep  me  out  of  it.  They  can 
help  me  discover  in  what  good  fortune  properly 
consists,  and  by  removing  obstacles  and  devel- 
oping opportunities,  they  can  help  me  attain  it, 
but  that  is  all.  Each  man  must  settle  his  own 
accounts  with  the  universe.  It  is  essentially  an 
individual  thing  to  live,  an  affair  between  nature 
and  man,  not  between  nature  and  men.  It  is  a 
unique  adventure,  in  which  defeat  is  certain  if  a 
man  decline  to  meet  Hfe  single-handed,  to  face 
the  adventure  in  the  awful  solitude  of  his  own 
personality. 

The  one  proper  function  of  all  public  activity 
is  liberation,  not  prescription,  and  this  whether 
the  activity  come  under  the  head  of  church 
or  state,  school  or  family,  industry  or  art.  The 
work  of  social  welfare  is  the  work  of  bringing 
freedom.  It  is  for  each  individual  to  work  out 
his  own  salvation.  No  one  can  do  it  for  him. 
No  system  of  patronage,  no  imposing  of  ideals  on 
the  part  of  one  class  towards  another,  no  im- 
perial rule,  however  beneficent,  no  paternalism, 
no  patting  on  the  back,  no  coddling,  no  self- 
constituted  providence,  can  take  the  place  of 
sturdy,  manly  independence.  Even  the  mistakes 
of  independence  are  more  valuable  and  more 
educative  than  the  noiseless,  perfect  mechanism 

258 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


of  an  outwardly  imposed  rule.  With  all  its  blun- 
dering, democracy  is  better  than  imperialism.  It 
is  worth  remarking  that  in  the  Garden  of  Eden 
there  was  no  fence  around  the  tree  of  the  know- 
ledge of  good  and  evil. 

Public  morality  has  always  this  double  aspect, 
—  a  negative  side,  the  removing  of  obstacles ; 
and  a  positive  side,  the  setting  up  of  opportuni- 
ties. Freedom  includes  these  affirmations  quite 
as  strenuously  as  the  negations.  Progress  is  in- 
deed just  this  broader  interpretation.  Freedom 
is  a  very  idle  word  if  it  mean  only  the  absence 
of  detaining  hands  and  prison  walls.  It  must 
include  helping  hands  and  the  possession  of  the 
instruments  necessary  to  the  carrying  out  of  life's 
purposes.  This  giving  flexibility  —  a  very  whole- 
some and  legitimate  flexibility  —  to  our  idea  of 
freedom  transforms  what  might  otherwise  be  a 
too  rigid  cardinal  virtue  of  the  social  type  into 
the  high  morality  of  a  general  helpful  attitude 
of  mind,  just  as  the  giving  flexibility  to  justice 
or  charity  or  love  enlarges  any  one  of  these  car- 
dinal virtues  into  the  full  measure  of  individual 
morality. 

On  the  negative  side  of  freedom,  public  moral- 
ity evidently  requires  non-interference  for  each 
individual.  He  must  be  free  in  all  matters  of 
dress,  diet,  shelter,  occupation,  belief,  speech,  in 
buying  and  selling,  in    sending   and   receiving 

259 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

intelligence,  in  the  transportation  of  himself  and 
his  belongings,  in  marriage  and  friendship,  in  the 
protection  of  person  and  property.  In  all  these 
and  similar  matters,  the  individual  must  not  be 
interfered  with,  nor  must  he  interfere  with  others. 
In  all  matters  that  concern  himself  alone,  —  the 
list  is  very  short,  however  —  he  may  properly 
claim  the  right  of  doing  as  he  pleases.  In  aU 
matters  that  concern  others,  —  the  much  longer 
list,  —  he  may  proceed  only  with  the  free  per- 
mission of  the  persons  involved.  Civilized  socie- 
ties make  some  approach  to  the  fulfillment  of  this 
negative  side  of  morality,  the  police  function. 
But  the  success  in  our  own  country  is  still  very 
partial,  how  partial  may  be  realized  by  the  study 
of  a  single  day's  events,  or  by  that  somewhat  dis- 
couraging study  of  the  newspaper  attempted  in 
the  earlier  part  of  the  chapter.  In  America,  a 
man  is  nominally  free  in  dress,  diet,  shelter,  occu- 
pation, belief,  and  speech,  with  the  proper  restric- 
tions that  some  dress  is  required  of  him  in  public, 
his  shelter  may  not  be  a  menace  to  surrounding 
structures,  his  occupation  may  not  pollute  the  air 
or  highway,  or  his  speech  create  uproar  and  dis- 
order. Curiously,  he  is  not  free  in  his  buying  and 
selling.  The  state  sets  up  a  protective  tariff,  not 
to  provide  a  revenue  for  the  carrying  out  of  its 
own  approved  activities,  but  for  the  express  pur- 
pose of  interfering  with  free  trade.  The  motive 

260 


SOCIAL   WELFARE, 


is  not  personal  aggression,  but  an  application  of 
the  belief  that  prosperity  is  impersonal  and  mate- 
rial, and  may  be  furthered  by  paternal  interfer- 
ence. The  policy  has  been  defended  by  able 
writers,  but  morally  belongs  to  a  class  of  mediaeval 
prohibitions  which  we  are  rapidly  outgrowing 
because  the  doctrine  of  social  freedom  shows 
them  to  be  indefensible. 

In  matters  of  intercourse  and  transportation, 
a  man  is  nominally  free,  and  in  his  personal  rela- 
tions, but  he  has  little  assurance  of  protection  to 
either  his  person  or  property.  In  to-day's  paper, 
to  turn  once  more  to  our  accepted  mirror  of  the 
good  times  upon  which  we  are  fallen,  one  reads 
of  a  highly  respectable  passenger  shot  dead  by 
masked  robbers  on  a  trolley  car  near  Los  Angeles, 
and  the  railroad  company  offering  a  reward  of 
a  thousand  dollars  apiece  for  the  apprehension 
of  the  murderers,  so  little  assured  is  it  that  the 
state  will  manage  the  business  successfully.  In 
the  matter  of  property,  there  are  few  of  us  will- 
ing to  carry  any  amount  of  money  about  us,  or 
to  keep  it  in  the  house.  We  have  locks  on  all 
our  doors,  fasteners  on  all  our  windows,  burglar 
alarms  in  unexpected  places.  We  hire  private 
watchmen,  we  have  recourse  to  private  detectives, 
we  keep  our  own  eyes  open  for  anything  that 
is  suspicious.  It  cannot  be  said  that  we  are  in 
a  position  .to  press  our  civilization  upon  other 

261 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

peoples  when  our  own  daily  home  life  is  still  so 
touched  with  barbarism. 

In  its  negative  or  police  function,  our  public 
morality  leaves  much  to  be  desired. 

The  setting  up  of  opportunities,  the  positive 
side  of  social  welfare,  is  naturally  a  later  devel- 
opment than  the  more  obvious  police  function. 
In  America  and  elsewhere,  society  has  made  a 
brave  beginning.  Freedom  interpreted  positively 
means  the  liberation  of  man  from  the  tyranny 
of  things,  from  time  and  distance,  ignorance  and 
disease,  privation  and  disaster.  It  means  the  open- 
ing of  wider  fields  of  activity  for  work  and  play 
and  research,  the  making  possible  of  a  larger  life. 

In  a  broad  way  it  may  be  said  that  anarchy 
and  socialism  represent  the  negative  and  positive 
aspects  of  freedom.  Anarchy  lays  undue  stress 
upon  non-interference  ;  socialism  lays  large  stress 
upon  opportunity.  Both  are  capable  of  an  ex- 
treme statement  which  carries  them  quite  outside 
of  social  welfare.  But  both  are  capable  of  a 
rational  interpretation  which  makes  them  neces- 
sary elements  of  freedom.  It  is  interesting  to 
note  that  modern  society,  as  it  grows  in  morality, 
shows  a  distinct  tendency  to  realize  the  best  in 
these  apparently  irreconcilable  movements. 

As  a  matter  of  actual  material  achievement, 
society  has  perhaps  gained  its  widest  positive  vic- 
tory in  the  line  of  intercourse,  the  sending  and 

262 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


receiving  of  intelligence,  and  in  the  transporta- 
tion of  small  goods.  For  a  purely  nominal  sum, 
the  post-of&ce  annihilates  distance  for  letters 
and  parcels,  and  adds  immensely  to  welfare  and 
opportunity.  The  telegraph  and  telephone,  joint 
annihilators  of  distance  and  time,  are  not  yet 
installed  as  social  liberators,  but  remain  efficient 
servitors  with  chained  hands  and  feet,  saturated 
with  the  idea  of  private  profit  rather  than  the 
idea  of  public  liberation.  The  railroads  are  in 
much  the  same  case,  annihilators  of  distance  for 
both  persons  and  goods,  but  still  charging  what 
the  traffic  will  bear,  and  untouched  by  the  idea 
of  their  larger  function  of  liberation. 

If  telegraph  and  telephone  and  railroad  could 
exist  as  private  enterprises,  one  could  properly 
demand  no  public  function  of  them,  however 
desirable  it  might  be  on  the  ground  of  social 
opportunity.  But  they  can  exist  at  all  only  by 
virtue  of  a  public  right  which  is  too  high  a  pre- 
rogative to  be  justly  delegated  to  any  private 
person  or  corporation,  —  the  right  of  eminent 
domain.  In  surrendering  his  land,  possibly  his 
very  house,  in  consenting  that  the  highways  be 
used  for  the  public  utilities,  the  individual  has 
ample  right  to  demand  that  these  utihties  shall 
be  administered  wholly  for  the  public  good. 
When  they  are  administered  for  private  profit, 
social  morality  is  violated. 

263 


THE    CHILDREN   OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

In  the  way  of  positive  liberation,  society  is 
also  doing  strenuous  work  in  abolishing  igno- 
rance and  furthering  knowledge,  a  work  carried 
out  by  the  public  school,  public  surveys,  scien- 
tific bureaus,  experiment  stations,  and  all  the 
increasing  machinery  of  socially  supported  inves- 
tigation. This  work  is  sometimes  condemned  as 
unwarranted  paternalism,  and  may  indeed  easily 
err  on  that  side,  but  at  its  best  and  looked  at  in 
a  broader  spirit,  it  may  justly  be  welcomed  as 
furthering  the  freedom  of  opportunity,  and  so 
contributing  to  social  welfare.  The  same  may 
also  be  said  of  public  highways,  public  illumina- 
tion, playgrounds,  parks,  baths,  sanitation,  light- 
houses, river  and  harbor  improvements,  and  all 
the  other  enginery  by  which  society  as  a  whole 
unites  to  diminish  the  tyranny  of  things  and 
increase  the  positive  freedom  of  the  individual. 

The  whole  question  is  a  very  large  one,  and  its 
details  demand  always  the  judicial  temper.  What 
we  all  want,  anarchist  and  socialist  alike,  what 
morality  wants,  is  the  largest  possible  measure 
of  true  freedom.  The  discussion  does  not  turn 
upon  the  social  end,  but  upon  the  method.  This 
can  hardly  be  known  a  priori ;  it  must  be  dis- 
covered by  experience.  In  its  earher  and  less- 
informed  stages,  the  social  work  of  enlarging 
opportunity  will  doubtless  be  accompanied  by  a 
certain  amount  of  aggression.    This  may  be  tol- 

264 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


erated  en  route,  until  we  learn  better,  but  never 
as  a  permanent  policy.  The  true  test  is  not  that 
coarse  generalization  so  often  applied  to  social 
brutalities,  —  the  good  of  the  many  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  few,  —  for  no  moral  man  would  be 
willing  to  accept  advantages  at  such  a  price. 
Even  if  he  were,  his  diminished  social  sensitive- 
ness would  in  the  end  more  than  compensate  for 
any  supposed  initial  good.  It  is  not  unfair  to 
compare  this  sort  of  social  action  with  what  we 
have  already  considered  and  condemned,  the  He 
of  convenience.  Indeed,  the  same  generalization 
may  properly  hold  that  the  good  of  any  individual 
member  of  the  group  may  be  morally  sacrificed 
only  under  those  extraordinary  circumstances 
when  the  group  as  a  whole  is  plainly  in  jeop- 
ardy. With  the  progress  of  civilization,  such 
circumstances  are  increasingly  rare.  Society  in 
the  long  run  can  deal  with  its  criminal  and 
insane  classes  without  asking  further  sacrifice 
from  the  individual  than  his  share  of  taxation.  In 
the  very  rare  case  of  an  invading  army,  the  vol- 
unteers who  fall  in  the  social  defense  may  properly 
be  said  to  have  gained  self-realization  rather  than 
to  have  suffered  self-sacrifice.  The  true  test  of 
all  this  debated  social  action  is  the  moral  test 
of  social  welfare.  Warfare  is  plainly  outside  the 
social  order.  Within  the  social  order,  welfare  is 
never  gained  at  the  sacrifice  of  the  individual. 

^65 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

In  our  American  handling  of  these  social 
problems  of  opportunity,  two  separate  adminis- 
trative methods  are  employed.  All  the  social 
activities  now  undertaken  are  considered  to  be 
for  the  public  good,  but  they  are  supported  in 
two  distinctly  different  ways.  The  post-office,  in 
spite  of  the  fact  that,  by  promoting  intercourse 
and  disseminating  information,  it  serves  society 
quite  as  vitally  as  any  of  the  other  public  agencies, 
is  nevertheless  practically  self-supporting.  Those 
who  use  the  post-office  pay  for  it,  and  pay  in 
exact  proportion  to  their  use.  The  other  public 
agencies  are  supported  by  taxation.  The  indi- 
vidual pays  for  their  support  quite  regardless  of 
his  personal  use  of  them.  Yet  it  cannot  be  said 
that  they  promote  welfare  any  more  keenly  than 
the  post-office  does.  In  many  cases  it  might 
reasonably  be  contended  that  they  are  less  gen- 
erally useful.  This  situation  certainly  suggests 
the  question  as  to  why  all  these  social  agencies 
are  not  on  the  same  administrative  footing, — 
why  the  post-office  is  not,  like  the  pubHc  school 
and  all  the  rest,  supported  by  taxation ;  or  why 
the  public  school  and  all  the  rest  are  not,  like  the 
post-office,  supported  by  fixed,  nominal  charges. 
There  seems  no  reason  in  the  case  of  such  similar 
utilities  why  the  method  of  support  should  not  be 
uniform.  Which  uniformity  is  desirable  is  another 
question.  Morality  can  suggest  only  that  while  the 

266 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


ideal  of  self-support  better  satisfies  the  require- 
ments of  formal  justice,  —  that  those  who  make 
use  of  social  opportunities  should  pay  for  them 
proportionately,  —  the  ultimate  question  of  right 
and  wrong  can  emerge  only  from  an  increased 
social  experience.  It  may  be,  as  the  taxationist 
contends,  that  all  individual  good  fortune  is  so 
heightened  by  any  general  increase  of  oppor- 
tunity and  resulting  intelligence  that  the  contri- 
butions levied  by  society  are  abundantly  justified. 
If  this  be  so,  the  principle  is  capable  of  almost 
indefinite  extension,  and  we  stand  at  the  be- 
ginning of  a  social  history  more  intricate  and 
remarkable  than  all  the  political  history  that  has 
gone  before. 

Whatever  method  may  finally  declare  itself  as 
the  most  ef&cient,  the  moral  end  remains  the 
same,  —  individual  good  fortune.  To  accept  this 
human  view  of  welfare  is  to  part  company  once 
for  all  with  that  profit-tainted  view  of  society 
which  now  makes  life  so  unnecessarily  difficult. 
The  function  of  a  moral  society  is  the  setting 
up  of  opportunity,  the  liberation  of  the  individ- 
ual from  the  tyranny  of  things,  the  minimizing 
of  effort  in  the  sustenance  of  mere  animal  life, 
food  and  clothing  and  shelter,  so  that  the  human 
life  may  begin  the  quest  of  strength  and  beauty 
and  accomplishment  and  goodness.  All  social 
activities  that  make  for  this  human  wealth  are 

267 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

moral :  all  that  make  against  human  wealth  are 
immoral. 

But  just  as  prosperity  is  individual,  and  not 
at  all  the  mass  phenomenon  that  it  is  commonly 
represented  to  be,  so  the  work  of  socializing 
and  humanizing  the  world  is  essentially  indi- 
vidual, not  a  mass  effort  directed  to  mass  results. 
It  must  be  carried  out  by  individuals  operating 
upon  individuals.  And  the  first  individual  to 
begin  with  is  manifestly  one's  self.  The  pledge  of 
good  fortune  might  helpfully  read  :  — 

1.  I  promise  to  treat  myself  as  an  individual ; 
to  seek  the  good  fortune  of  strength  and  beauty 
and  accomplishment  and  goodness ;  to  place 
human  considerations  before  material  considera- 
tions ;  to  decline  all  profit  gained  at  the  expense 
of  men  and  women  and  children ;  to  work  only 
for  human  wealth. 

2.  I  promise  to  treat  others  as  individuals ;  to 
help  them  in  their  quest  of  personal  good  for- 
tune ;  to  put  no  obstacles  in  their  way ;  to  remove 
all  obstacles  that  I  can ;  to  treat  their  efforts 
after  perfection  seriously  and  sympathetically; 
to  avoid  personal  ridicule  and  disparagement ;  to 
cultivate  a  universal  comradeship. 

3.  I  promise  to  further  social  welfare ;  to  pro- 
mote the  idea  that  prosperity  consists  essentially 
in  persons  and  only  incidentally  in  things ;  to 
be  true  to  this  faith  in  public  and  in  private,  in 

268 


SOCIAL    WELFARE 


work  and  in  play ;  to  help,  so  far  as  I  can,  the 
freedom  of  non-interference  and  of  opportunity ; 
to  seek  in  all  social  intercourse  the  seriousness 
and  beauty  of  a  high  purpose. 

Such  a  pledge  is  essentially  a  unit  pledge,  for 
one's  duties  to  the  self,  to  the  neighbor,  to  a  more 
abstract  society,  are  at  heart  one  and  the  same 
thing,  —  an  unfaltering  regard  for  persons.  Yet 
each  relation  sheds  light  upon  the  other  relations, 
and  makes  the  more  complete  morality  possible. 
It  is  also  true  that  the  greatest  moral  obscurity 
is  apt  to  prevail  in  those  relations  which  affect 
persons  with  whom  we  do  not  come  in  personal 
contact.  A  man  may  lead  a  fairly  clean  life  in 
his  own  person,  may  be  reasonably  just  and  con- 
siderate in  his  treatment  of  friends,  acquaint- 
ances, servants,  and  yet  fail  most  miserably  in  his 
dealings  with  that  less  personal  public,  whose 
hand  he  does  not  touch  and  whose  eye  he  does 
not  catch.  This  particular  failure  in  morality  is 
the  one  most  natural  to  modern  conditions.  It 
is  favored  by  the  '  anonymousness '  of  large 
cities,  by  the  crowd  of  persons  who  serve  us 
without  ever  being  seen,  by  the  magnitude  of 
current  business  operations,  by  the  substitution 
of  corporations  and  trusts  for  more  personal 
proprietors  and  firms.  Modern  inventions  have 
favored   this    anonymousness,    this   impersonal; 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

wholesale  way  of  conducting  affairs.  The  rail- 
road, the  telegraph,  telephone,  and  cable,  the  ste- 
nographer, steam,  and  electricity,  have  made  this 
concentration  possible,  this  separation  between 
the  directors  and  the  agents.  The  absence  of 
personal  relations  easily  gives  an  unsocial  twist 
to  the  thought.  Most  failures  in  morality  are 
due  primarily  to  a  lack  of  imagination.  Men  and 
women  who  concern  themselves  with  children's 
aid  societies,  and  vacation  schools,  and  newsboys' 
homes,  and  humane  enterprises  generally  that 
happen  to  come  under  their  own  eye,  do  not 
hesitate  to  burn  coal  that  has  been  freed  from 
slate  by  pale-faced  children  down  in  Pennsylvania 
coal-breakers,  or  to  accept  fat  dividends  from  the 
coal  companies  and  coal-carrying  railroads.  These 
humane  men  and  women  do  not  hesitate  to  wear 
fabrics  made  in  part  by  child-labor  in  noisy  South- 
ern cotton  mills,  or  to  accept  their  own  share  of 
the  evil  profit.  It  is  not  slavery  that  most  of  us 
object  to,  but  the  slavery  that  shows  itself. 

Social  welfare  measured  in  terms  of  things  is 
an  impossible  state  of  affairs,  impossible  theoreti- 
cally, and  if  history  bear  credible  witness,  impos- 
sible practically.  It  is  bread  and  the  circus  and 
doomsday.  Instead  of  things  being  in  the  saddle 
and  riding  mankind,  as  Emerson  justly  com- 
plains, we  must  reverse  the  matter  and  have  man- 
kind securely  in  the  saddle. 

270 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


Individual  morality  is  of  a  piece.  Any  breach 
of  the  moral  law  is  a  breach  of  the  whole  law.  The 
same  law-giver  who  said,  '  Thou  shalt  not  com- 
mit adultery/  said  also,  ^Thou  shalt  not  steal.' 
Any  transgression,  whatever  its  specific  nature, 
is  against  one  underlying  principle.  Individual 
morality  does  not  consist  in  the  pursuit  of  specific 
cardinal  virtues.  This  may  lead,  indeed,  to  a  cer- 
tain dogmatic  hardness  and  inflexibility  not  at  all 
consistent  with  morality.  It  is  rather  a  general 
attitude  of  mind  and  habit  towards  all  life,  a 
distinct  soundness  of  the  moral  fibre.  So  public 
morality  is  of  a  piece,  does  not  consist  in  the 
inflexible,  letter-bound  pursuit  of  any  one  cardi- 
nal social  virtue,  whether  it  have  to  do  with  land 
tenure,  the  suffrage,  industrial  policy,  irrigation, 
forestry,  immigration,  municipal  control.  All 
these  issues  must  be  met,  studied,  and  solved. 
They  have  their  proper  place  as  elements  of  wel- 
fare. But  public  morality  is  that  general  attitude 
towards  public  questions  which  enables  the  indi- 
vidual to  apply  wisely  the  touchstone  of  social 
welfare.  There  is  no  panacea  of  doctrine  which 
will  dispense  with  the  careful,  detailed  study  of 
particular  social  problems.  There  are  separate 
problems,  but  not  separate  moralities.  A  com- 
munity which  could  make  the  central,  dominant 
motive  in  all  its  activity  an  intelligent  desire  to 
further  human  wealth,  to  promote  the  freedom  of 

271 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

non-interference  and  opportunity,  would  attain 
quite  unavoidably  its  own  more  abstract  end, 
social  welfare.  But  after  all,  the  problem  is  indi- 
vidual. The  community  cannot  start  such  a  work. 
It  has  no  power  of  initiative.  It  is  folly  to  appeal 
to  it,  to  praise  it,  to  blame  it.  The  work  must 
begin  with  individuals,  —  the  community  is  a 
result.  When  the  idea  spreads  from  man  to  man, 
the  community  becomes  socialized,  and  the  result 
is  welfare. 

This  reflection  that  the  individual  may  be  the 
point  of  application  of  a  tremendous  social  force 
lends  dignity  and  added  significance  to  all  indi- 
vidual efforts  after  perfection.  The  individual  is 
the  keeper  of  the  national  destiny.  It  is  really 
he  who  determines  whether  America  shall  be  free 
and  noble,  strong  and  great,  or  whether  she 
shall  fail.  All  nations  have  failed.  They  have 
had  their  youth,  their  manhood,  their  old  age. 
They  have  been  and  now  are  not.  What  is  the 
secret  of  this  universal  decay?  Are  the  issues 
of  life  and  death  the  same  with  nations  as  with 
men  ?  Must  they,  too,  spring  up,  flourish  for  a 
time,  and  then  die  ?  It  would  hardly  seem  neces- 
sary. The  nation  is  made  up  of  a  multitude  of 
men,  and  though  the  individual  man  dies,  man- 
kind itself  endures.  The  material  for  the  daily 
rebuilding  of  the  nation  is  always  at  hand.  The 
truth  is,  that  when  a  nation  dies,  it  dies  of  moral 

272 


SOCIAL   WELFARE 


heart-failure.  Under  the  outer  defeat  there  is  an 
inner  and  more  overwhelming  defeat.  Efficiency 
and  worth  are  wanting.  Public  morality,  like 
private  morality,  is  essentially  self-preservative. 
The  individual  who  risks  his  life  for  some  un- 
worthy end,  for  houses  or  land  or  gold,  and 
perishes,  may  commend  himself  to  our  pity,  but 
not  to  our  admiration  or  our  sympathy.  The 
nation  which  spends  itself  unworthily  in  the  pur- 
suit of  things,  rather  than  in  the  furtherance  of 
human  excellence  and  beauty,  passes  into  the 
tomb  equally  unmourned.  Social  welfare,  like 
the  individual  good  fortune  of  which  it  is  built 
up,  is  personal  and  human,  and  for  its  stability 
and  permanence  depends  upon  the  excellence  of 
men  and  women  and  children. 


XII 

THE  MORALITY  OF  THE  FOUR  INSTITU- 
TIONS 

CIVILIZATION  has  developed  four  institu- 
tions now  so  well  organized  and  so  appar- 
ently essential  to  social  life  that  we  almost  forget 
that  they  are  human  devices,  and  come  to  regard 
them  as  a  part  of  the  established  order  of  nature. 
The  family,  the  school,  the  church,  and  the  state 
constitute  a  social  environment  in  which  the 
modern  man  is  to  the  manner  born.  It  is  diffi- 
cult for  him  to  imagine  a  life  devoid  of  an}'^  of 
these  four  institutions,  and  quite  impossible  for 
him  to  imagine  a  life  devoid  of  all  of  them.  To 
most  men  and  to  nearly  all  women  these  institu- 
tions have  a  sacredness  which  well-nigh  excludes 
them  from  discussion,  and  makes  every  proposi- 
tion to  abolish  them,  or  even  to  modify  them  in 
any  radical  way,  a  proposition  at  once  irrational 
and  painful.  To  the  majority,  the  family  is  the 
institute  of  the  affections ;  the  school,  the  insti- 
tute of  opportunity ;  the  church,  the  institute  of 
duty ;  and  the  state,  the  institute  of  rights.  These 
elements  of  human  life  —  affection,  opportunity, 
duty,  right  —  are  admittedly  too  fundamental  to 

274 


THE  FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


be  at  any  time  dispensed  with.  Were  the  pe- 
culiar institutions  which  now  officially  embody 
these  elements  essential  to  their  preservation  and 
expansion,  all  moral  persons  would  unhesitat- 
ingly ascribe  to  the  institutions  themselves  the 
same  permanent  and  abiding  character. 

But  we  have  in  our  midst  a  company  of  alert, 
and  on  the  whole  intelligent  persons,  who  unre- 
servedly admit  the  first  series  of  facts,  that  affec- 
tion, opportunity,  duty,  and  right  are  necessary 
elements  of  the  moral  life,  but  who  resolutely 
deny  the  second  series  of  facts,  that  the  insti- 
tutions which  have  fostered  these  elements  in 
the  past  are  necessary  to  their  preservation  in  the 
present  or  their  expansion  in  the  future.  The 
state,  the  church,  the  school,  and  the  family  have 
all  been  called  in  question.  The  philosophical 
anarchist  —  not  at  all  to  be  confounded  with  the 
gentlemen  who  carry  a  red  flag  —  has  asked  for 
the  abolition  of  the  state  on  the  ground  that  it  is 
now  an  outgrown  institution,  which  evolution  has 
distinctly  left  behind,  and  that  the  next  step  for- 
ward is  to  be  into  a  still  more  unqualified  indi- 
vidual freedom.  The  free-religious  man,  as  well 
as  the  agnostic,  would  abolish  the  church  on  the 
ground  that  it  stands  between  man  and  the  un- 
known with  a  ritual  which  obstructs  rather  than 
promotes  the  soul's  growth,  and  brings  too  defi- 
nite news  from  a  world  essentially  unknowable. 

275 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

A  few  radical  thinkers  would  have  done  with 
the  school  as  a  humanly  crippling  institution, 
and  would  send  mankind  back  to  the  natural  dis- 
cipline of  daily  work  and  play.  A  considerable 
company  of  men  and  women  of  pronounced  indi- 
vidualistic tendencies  would  do  away  with  the 
family  on  the  ground  that  it  is  an  obstruction  to 
individual  development  and  growth. 

Between  these  extreme  groups — the  conserva- 
tives, who  would  keep  everything  just  as  it  is, 
and  the  radicals,  who  would  abolish  one  or  more 
of  the  established  institutions  —  there  is  natu- 
rally a  wide  gulf  fixed ;  but  whatever  our  own 
predilections,  it  would  be  disloyal  to  the  fact 
to  believe  that  all  virtue  is  to  be  found  on  either 
side.  Conservatism,  being  the  creed  of  the  ma- 
jority, needs  the  less  defending.  It  always  has 
been  the  home  of  gentleness  and  worth,  as  well 
as  of  narrow-mindedness  and  bigotry.  Radical- 
ism, the  creed  of  the  minority,  needs  the  more 
consideration,  for  it  has  necessarily  harbored 
strange  bedfellows,  those  below  the  social  level 
and  those  above,  degenerates  and  saints.  Since 
partisanship  for  any  or  all  of  the  four  institu- 
tions touches  the  deepest  feelings  and  prejudices, 
it  may  give  a  desirable  mental  flexibility  to 
remember  that  the  typical  opponents  of  each 
institution  have  been  among  the  best  minds  of 
the  two  hemispheres.    Anarchy  is  represented  by 

276 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


so  distinguished  an  advocate  as  Prince  Kropot- 
kin ;  free  religion  by  no  less  a  person  than  Mr. 
Emerson ;  anti-scholasticism  by  so  cosmopolitan 
a  force  as  Count  Tolstoy.  It  is  more  difficult  to 
select  an  admirable  example  of  the  anti-family 
cult,  for  too  often  its  votaries  have  become  en- 
meshed in  the  scandals  of  free  love,  but  it  is  per- 
missible to  point  out  that  in  every  community 
some  of  the  best  types  of  men  and  women  are  to 
be  found  among  those  persons  who  have  not,  as 
the  world  phrases  it,  been  disappointed  in  love, 
but  who  have  deliberately  elected  bachelorhood 
and  spinsterhood  as  the  more  favorable  condition 
for  the  unfolding  of  the  spirit.  And  their  com- 
pany appears  to  be  increasing.  It  is  also  signifi- 
cant that  the  transient  family  as  opposed  to  the 
fixed  family  is  more  common  than  formerly.  On 
all  sides  one  sees  experiments  in  adoption,  not 
alone  of  sons  and  daughters,  but  also  of  brothers 
and  sisters,  and  other  relatives,  as  well  as  the 
many  voluntary  associations  between  men  and 
men,  and  women  and  women.  Mr.  Meredith's 
suggestion  of  ten-year  marriages,  whether  we 
take  it  seriously  or  not,  is  at  least  significant 
of  a  growing  feeling  that  family  life  may  be  a 
tyranny  as  well  as  a  blessing.  Perhaps  Mr.  Mere- 
dith may  serve  as  our  eminent  exponent  of  the 
family  seceder. 

We  have  tried  to  present  morality  as  a  dispas- 

277 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

sionate  scrutiny  of  human  life,  bent  on  seeing 
things  as  they  are,  and  so  discovering  what  is 
essentially  right  and  what  is  essentially  wrong 
in  human  conduct.  Nowhere  will  this  dispassion- 
ateness be  more  needed  than  in  attempting  to 
measure  the  morality  of  family,  school,  church, 
and  state,  and  especially  if  the  measurement  is 
to  be  at  all  thoroughgoing.  All  these  institu- 
tions have  aroused  in  their  defense,  or  for  their 
attack,  the  fiercest  passions  of  which  mankind  is 
capable.  But  morality  does  not  share  this  pas- 
sion. To  morality,  none  of  these  four  institu- 
tions is  sacred  in  itself.  They  are  simply  modes 
of  organized  conduct,  and  as  such  are  open  to 
the  criticism  of  efficiency  and  worth.  If  they 
make  individuals  larger  and  happier  persons,  if 
they  make  the  social  tissue  sounder,  they  are 
moral  institutions.  If  they  fail  to  do  this,  or 
operate  in  a  reverse  direction,  they  are  immoral. 
Historically,  all  these  institutions  have  been  both 
moral  and  immoral.  As  a  present  experience 
they  are  both  moral  and  immoral.  There  have 
been  and  are  families  where  the  affections  are 
starved  and  degraded ;  schools  where  opportuni- 
ties are  withheld ;  churches  where  duties  are 
obscured ;  states  where  justice  is  denied.  In  the 
face  of  these  past  and  present  facts,  it  is  idle  to 
proclaim  such  institutions  sacred.  The  most  that 
one  can  say  is  that  the  ideal  family  is  sacred,  the 

278 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


ideal  school,  the  ideal  church,  the  ideal  state. 
But  this  is  to  pass  into  that  region  of  absolute 
moralities,  where  the  human  spirit,  however  free 
its  respiration,  must  forever  remember  that  it  is 
breathing  the  atmosphere  of  what  may  be,  rather 
than  of  what  is.  In  reality,  the  family,  school, 
church,  and  state  are  very  human  institutions, 
and  are  subject  to  the  same  frailties  that  all 
human  conduct  is  subject  to.  To  remove  them 
from  wholesome  and  thoroughgoing  criticism  is 
to  make  impossible  the  higher  excellence  of 
which  each  is  capable.  But  even  if  they  all  came 
up  to  the  ideal  requirements,  it  would  still  be 
an  immorality  to  regard  the  institutions  as  final- 
ities. For,  meanwhile,  morality  is  advancing  to 
new  insights  and  higher  standards.  It  is  salutary 
to  remember  that  no  institution  can  be  both 
static  and  moral.  If  there  be  a  super-family,  a 
super-school,  a  super-church,  a  super-state,  which 
will  further  individual  good  fortune  and  social 
welfare  more  efficiently  than  their  established 
prototypes  further  them,  then  it  is  to  the  new 
order  that  morality  is  pledged.  Historically,  we 
have  come  out  of  positions  once  approved  and 
canonized  into  positions  now  recognized  to  be 
distinctly  superior.  Much  of  the  heart-burn  of 
old  age  comes  about  from  a  failure  to  recognize 
the  changed  face  of  duty.  The  younger  genera- 
tion does  not  do  what  the  older  generation  did, 

279 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

and  ought  not  to  do  it.  False  judgments  are 
reached  by  applying  outworn  standards  to  pre- 
sent events.  In  the  same  way,  false  historical 
estimates  are  made  current  by  applying  con- 
temporary standards  to  bygone  events.  Both 
mistakes  tend  to  belittle  the  genuine  morality 
of  the  world. 

It  is  simply,  then,  as  contemporary  hum^  con- 
duct that  we  propose  to  examine  very  briefly  the 
morality  of  these  institutions,  beginning  with 
the  most  intimate  and  concrete  of  the  four,  — 
the  family. 

As  society  is  now  constituted,  all  children  of 
normal  and  approved  circumstance  are  born  in 
wedlock,  and  so  begin  life  as  members  of  a  fam- 
ily. The  relations  of  parent  and  child,  brother 
and  sister,  thus  set  up  are  regarded  by  the  state 
as  permanent,  and  are  terminated  only  at  death. 
The  normal  man  has  no  experience  of  life  out- 
side of  the  family,  and  can  only  speculate  as 
to  what  it  would  mean  to  be  free  from  both 
the  obligations  and  opportunities  of  family  life. 
He  has  mother  and  father,  brothers  and  sisters. 
Outside  of  this  intimate  group  he  has  the  more 
diluted  family  ties  represented  by  grandparents, 
aunts  and  uncles,  cousins,  and  later  in  life,  per- 
haps nieces  and  nephews.  So  far,  these  relation- 
ships are  quite  involuntary.  They  are  the  ties 
which  a  man  does  not  elect,  however  precious 

280 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 

he  may  count  them,  but  to  which  he  is  merely 
born. 

The  average  man  is  thus  a  member  of  a 
particular  human  group,  and  stands  to  other 
members  of  the  same  group  in  relations  of  di- 
minishing intimacy.  With  sensitive,  high-minded 
men,  blood  is  always  thicker  than  water.  There 
is  an  agreeable  sense  of  family  obligation  which 
would  make  a  man  alive  to  the  needs  of  those 
nearest  of  kin.  This  concern  will  naturally  be 
more  alert  in  regard  to  one's  immediate  family, 
—  mother  and  father,  sister  and  brother.  It  is  the 
result  of  complex  feeling.  At  its  best,  it  comes 
from  that  genuine  and  deep  affection  which  is 
prompted  by  a  knowledge  of  the  excellence  of 
its  object,  an  excellence  better  perc^ved  in  the 
intimacy  of  family  life  than  by  an  outside  and 
alien  observer.  Later,  there  comes  a  desire  to 
make  some  return  for  the  large  benefits  enjoyed 
as  a  member  of  the  group,  for  the  love  and  loyal 
devotion  which  made  early  life  so  full  of  hap- 
piness and  opportunity.  In  more  calculating 
minds,  there  is  perhaps  a  feeling  of  mutual  de- 
pendence ;  a  man  would  admit  family  claims  in 
the  same  spirit  that  he  would  expect,  in  case  of 
need,  to  have  them  admitted  by  other  members 
of  the  group.  In  happy  family  life  these  feel- 
ings are  seldom  or  never  analyzed.  The  relation 
is  so  natural  and  so  beneficent  that  it  is  taken 

281 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

for  granted,  and  each  tries  to  do  his  share  with- 
out at  all  asking  why.  The  family  relation  and 
its  obligations  have  become  instincts. 

Those  who  look  persistently  on  this  bright  and 
beautiful  side  of  family  life  are  impatient  of  all 
doubt  as  to  its  morality  and  social  utility.  Yet 
there  is  a  darker  side  which  morality  may  not 
ignore.  That  very  intimacy  of  family  life  which 
makes  possible  the  best  fruits  of  the  affections 
also  makes  possible  the  exercise  of  the  most  un- 
bridled selfishness.  Parents  of  smaller  mind  are 
especially  prone  to  violate  the  principle  of  free- 
dom—  the  cardinal  social  virtue  —  in  dealing 
with  their  own  children.  Often  the  injustice  is 
due  to  a  failure  of  the  imagination.  It  is  difficult 
to  realize  that  these  children,  once  so  helpless, 
once  so  dependent  upon  the  wise  decision  of 
father  and  mother  for  each  small  event  of  the 
day,  are  now  distinct  personalities,  and  are  devel- 
oping needs  of  increasing  urgency.  Sometimes, 
with  the  best  intentions  in  the  world,  parents 
grow  into  a  tyrannous  attitude  of  mind,  which 
makes  any  moral  relation  impossible.  That  chil- 
dren have  distinct  rights,  rights  which  become 
more  imperative  with  each  added  year,  is  a  mod- 
ern conception  of  large  moral  value.  Looking  at 
the  matter  solely  from  the  child's  point  of  view 
(since  we  are  now  considering  only  the  involun- 
tary family  relations),  it  is  clear  that  as  he  was 

282 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


brought  into  the  world  without  his  own  consent, 
without  in  any  way  being  consulted,  there  can 
be  no  defensible  theory  of  contract,  of  reciprocal 
obligation  on  the  part  of  the  child.  In  early 
years  all  the  obligation  is  properly  on  the  side  of 
the  parents.  Little  children,  through  their  active 
affections,  are  led  to  give  much,  but  it  must  be 
accepted  as  an  out-and-out  gift,  not  as  a  pretty 
duty.  A  reciprocal  obligation  on  their  part  can 
be  created  later  in  life  only  when  the  parents  by 
wise  care  and  forethought  have  rendered  a  ser- 
vice worthy  of  honest  gratitude.  The  obedience 
of  children,  the  so-called  duty  of  children  to  pai^ 
ents,  are  social  conveniences  of  a  high  order, 
but  they  may  easily  be  stretched  to  the  point  of 
out-and-out  immorality. 

A  wise  parent  will  properly  exercise  a  large 
control  over  his  own  child  to  keep  him  from 
harm,  and  to  open  wide  the  door  of  opportunity. 
But  the  limit  of  this  control  is  determined  by 
the  child's  own  good.  Such  control  may  never 
be  morally  exercised  for  the  parent's  good,  may 
never  be  arbitrary,  and  may  never  extend  be- 
yond the  narrow  territory  of  necessity. 

The  ultimate  problem  of  each  child  is  to  work 
out  his  own  destiny,  to  achieve  his  own  indi- 
vidual good  fortune.  Parental  control  starts 
out  necessarily  with  an  absolutism  limited  only 
by  the  prohibition  to  take  life,  but  morally  this 

283 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

control  must  be  gradually  given  over,  and  just 
as  soon  as  safety  allows,  must  be  given  over  alto- 
gether. The  son  and  daughter  have  not  only  the 
right,  but  the  moral  obligation,  to  decide  for 
themselves  all  the  questions  of  adult  life,  —  whom 
they  will  marry,  what  they  will  do,  where  they 
will  live,  what  they  will  believe,  with  whom  they 
will  associate.  All  wise  parents  would  wish,  by 
heredity  and  early  training  and  later  counsel,  to 
help  their  children  to  determine  wisely  these  vital 
questions,  just  as  children  happily  impressed  with 
the  goodness  and  wisdom  of  their  parents  would 
naturally  seek  their  advice  and  guidance  in  such 
matters.  But  parents  may  give  advice  only  under 
precisely  the  same  conditions  that  other  wise  and 
interested  persons  may  give  it,  —  that  is  to  say, 
without  insisting  that  the  advice  be  followed. 
And  young  people  may  heed  advice  only  when 
it  comes  without  compulsion,  and  leaves  unim- 
paired their  own  inalienable  moral  responsibility. 
When  the  necessary  coercion  of  earlier  years 
is  carried  over  into  young  manhood  and  woman- 
hood, the  family  relation  becomes  distinctly  im- 
moral both  for  those  who  exercise  the  pressure 
and  those  who  submit  to  it.  Human  life  is  too 
august  a  thing  to  be  delegated  to  another,  even 
to  a  parent,  or  brother,  or  sister.  Life  belongs, 
inviolate,  to  the  liver  of  the  life.  This  immoral 
family  pressure  is  more  apt  to  be  tyrannous  with 

284 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


girls  than  with  boys,  and  more  apt  to  be  yielded 
to.  Somehow  it  is  realized  that  boys  must  make 
their  own  way  in  the  world,  and  that  leading- 
strings  from  either  parent  mean  ultimate  decrease 
of  power  and  character.  And  boys  have  a  way 
of  pressing  this  claim,  so  that  it  may  not  be  read- 
ily ignored.  In  the  case  of  children  of  mature 
years  who  remain  at  home  and  accept  support 
from  the  family  purse,  there  is  naturally  a  greater 
obligation  of  compHance  than  in  the  case  of  chil- 
dren who  are  self-supporting,  but  the  obligation 
is  carried  too  far  when  it  involves  loss  of  spiritual 
independence. 

Even  with  the  best  of  good  feeling  on  all  sides, 
family  relations  are  difficult  to  adjust.  To  be 
successful,  the  adjustments  must  be  made  on 
strictly  moral  grounds,  —  an  unfaltering  respect 
for  individual  rights,  an  unfaltering  assertion  of 
individual  integrity.  Too  often  the  family  is  an 
essentially  immoral  institution,  where  discourtesy, 
oppression,  even  brutality,  are  freely  indulged  in, 
where  manners  and  morals  appear  as  it  were  in 
undress.  The  very  privacy  of  the  family  covers  up 
much  wrong-doing.  It  is  notorious  that  busi- 
ness relations  within  the  family  are,  on  the  whole, 
less  successful  and  scrupulous  than  between 
strangers.  That  the  family  can  be  made  the  very 
condition  for  the  display  of  all  that  is  finest  and 
most  beautiful  in   human  life,   the  nearest  ap- 

285 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

proach  that  man  can  make  to  a  heaven  on  earth, 
makes  any  degradation  and  defilement  of  the 
family  relations  the  more  serious  offense. 

These  considerations  apply  primarily  to  the 
relations  within  the  family  group  to  which  a  man 
is  born,  the  involuntary  relations.  The  moral 
problem  becomes  vastly  more  delicate  and  com- 
plicated when  we  consider  the  family  relations 
which  a  man  creates  for  himself  in  marriage 
and  parenthood.  The  relation  between  man  and 
woman,  as  man  and  woman,  is  the  most  funda- 
mental of  all  human  relations,  for  upon  it  depends 
the  continuance  of  the  race,  as  well  as  the  hap- 
piness and  perfection  of  the  individuals  them- 
selves. If  the  primitive  morality  of  self-preserva- 
tion apply  to  society  as  well  as  to  the  individual, 
it  is  clear  that  the  social  tissue  is  sound  only 
when  it  offers  conditions  favorable  to  the  birth 
of  a  new  generation,  but  it  is  a  far  cry  from  this 
statement  to  the  preposterous  doctrine  that  mar- 
riage and  parenthood  are  therefore  social  duties. 

The  whole  question  of  marriage  and  parent- 
hood must  be  decided  by  men  and  women  on 
purely  individual  grounds,  and  no  decision  is 
a  priori  moral.  The  nloral  quality  of  the  deci- 
sion depends  upon  circumstances.  If  marriage 
mean  the  deepening  and  broadening  and  height- 
ening of  the  individual  life,  as  for  many  persons 
it  undoubtedly  does,  and  if  wholesome,  beautiful 

286 


THE    FOUR    INSTITUTIONS 


children  can  be  brought  forth  in  love  and  joy, 
then  marriage  and  parenthood  represent  a  genu- 
ine morality,  and  their  omission  involves  the 
immorality  of  the  second-best. 

In  general,  the  possession  of  a  normal  function 
implies  satisfaction  and  propriety  in  its  exercise. 
The  cycle  of  life  for  all  organisms  is  the  simple 
pentagon,  birth,  nutrition,  growth,  reproduction, 
death.  In  normal  men  and  women,  the  reproduc- 
tive instinct  is  a  part  of  the  sound  animal  inher- 
itance, and  obedience  to  it  stands  for  the  whole- 
some fulfillment  of  life's  purposes.  This  instinct 
for  parenthood  is  the  basis  of  the  family  life.  In 
the  beginning,  it  may  well  have  been  a  purely 
animal  function.  Potentially,  however,  it  was  an 
ideal  basis,  for  in  the  intimacy  of  the  family  have 
grown  up  those  sentiments  and  emotions  which 
now  glorify  our  human  life. 

Reproduction,  from  the  social  point  of  view, 
remains  the  fundamental  element  in  marriage. 
The  old  English  law  provides  that  a  man  may 
divorce  his  wife  on  the  sole  ground  of  barren- 
ness. But  individually,  the  desire  for  children  is 
only  one  out  of  many  emotions,  and  in  the  case 
of  the  most  developed  men  and  women  is  not 
even  the  major  one.  Along  with  this  reproduc- 
tive instinct,  obscuring  it,  even  supplanting  it,  go 
the  more  disinterested  non-sexual  love,  the  genu- 
ine comradeship,  the  community  of  intellectual 

287 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

and  spiritual  interest,  which  at  their  best  would 
separately  make  of  marriage  a  high  adventure  in 
good  fortune. 

Our  older  family  life,  even  the  family  life  of 
fifty  years  ago,  was  an  autocracy,  with  the  man 
as  autocrat.  Woman  as  the  weaker  vessel  was 
given  to  man  to  do  with  according  to  his  plea- 
sure. Both  types  remain,  the  family  autocrat  and 
the  wife  who  affects  womanly  weakness  and  dis- 
parages a  strong  mind.  But  modern  family  hfe, 
at  its  best,  has  reached  a  higher  moral  plane 
than  this.  It  is  a  sacred  contract  between  two 
equal  individuals,  a  man  and  a  woman,  and  all 
that  is  voluntary  within  the  family  life,  mainte- 
nance, opportunity,  parenthood,  is  the  result  of 
free  and  unpersuaded  consent.  In  such  a  moral 
union,  parenthood  will  be  exercised  only  when 
the  conditions  permit  an  expectation  of  well-born 
children,  and  the  family  circumstances  give  rea- 
sonable assurance  of  their  decent  maintenance. 

It  is  impossible  to  regulate  the  morality  of  fam- 
ily life  from  without.  The  state  may  insist  upon 
monogamy,  may  prohibit  wife-beating,  may  decree 
a  decent  support  for  wife  and  children,  may  com- 
pel a  certain  minimum  of  formal  education,  but 
the  subtler  part  of  morality,  the  finesse  upon  which 
the  success  of  family  life  depends,  rests  with  the 
man  and  woman.  If  there  be  no  children,  there 
is  still  partnership  in  a  life  larger  and  more  com- 

288 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


plicated  than  either  has  yet  known  ;  if  there  be 
children,  the  man  and  woman  have  become  joint 
rulers  in  a  little  kingdom  full  not  only  of  beauti- 
ful possibilities,  but  also  of  grave  and  difficult 
problems.  And  this  situation  is  not  one  into 
which  the  man  was  born ;  it  is  one  that  he  has 
created  for  himself.  Not  even  the  fact  that  love 
is  blind  removes  the  individual  responsibility. 

If  a  man  cannot  meet  the  complex  duties  of 
family  life  joyously  and  generously,  becoming 
himself  the  larger  and  more  moral  person  in  the 
doing  of  them,  then  family  hfe  is  not  for  him 
and  must  be  given  over  with  other  immoralities. 
A  grave  social  difficulty  arises  from  the  fact  that 
men  and  women  cannot  know  certainly  their  ap- 
titude or  inaptitude  for  married  life  before  the 
experiment  is  actually  made,  and  the  particular 
man  and  the  particular  woman  are  equally  in  the 
dark  as  to  whether  they  are  sufficiently  suited 
to  each  other  to  make  the  experiment  together 
with  reasonable  hope  of  success.  The  conditions 
of  modern  social  life  are  more  favorable  for  the 
development  of  a  sentimental  fancy  than  for 
the  development  of  a  genuine  and  abiding  pas- 
sion. For,  as  a  rule,  men  and  women  do  not 
work  together.  They  merely  play  together,  and 
this  means  that  they  meet  somewhat  casually  and 
intermittently.  They  see  each  other  in  the  arti- 
ficial relations  of  life  rather  than  the  essential 

389 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

ones.  This  is  true  of  all  classes,  and  perhaps 
particularly  true  of  the  idle  social  class.  A  pre- 
ference for  automohiling  over  yachting,  for  dogs 
over  horses,  even  for  Browning  over  Tennyson, 
is  not  a  sufficiently  serious  ground  for  successful 
family  life.  And  it  is  a  question  whether,  in  our 
present  industrial  world,  the  absence  of  sincere 
living  and  high  thinking  on  the  part  of  most  of 
our  wage-takers  does  not  incapacitate  them  for 
entering  into  anything  like  an  ideal  marriage. 
Considering  the  conditions  under  which  the  ma- 
jority of  marriages  are  made,  it  is  perhaps  credit- 
able to  our  human  nature  that  so  many  of  them 
are  even  tolerably  successful.  But  morality  is  not 
satisfied  with  the  mere  absence  of  open  disaster, 
not  even  with  what  might  be  called  a  half  suc- 
cess. The  grand  passion  which  might  have  been, 
the  passion  that  turns  a  dull  world  into  a  para- 
dise, and  men  and  women  into  gods  ;  the  beauti- 
ful children  which  might  have  been,  the  children 
that  bring  light  and  glory  into  the  humblest 
home ;  the  high  comradeship  which  might  have 
been,  the  comradeship  that  robs  Hfe  of  its  one 
hardly  escapable  tragedy  of  loneliness ;  the  spirit- 
ual consolation  which  might  have  been,  the  con- 
solation that  gives  courage  and  hope  in  the  face  of 
every  disaster, — all  this  potential  good  stands  as  a 
constant  rebuke  to  the  threadbare  thing  which  is. 
The  family  is  peculiarly  the  institute  of  the 
290 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


affections,  and  in  this  life-giving  atmosphere  the 
best  elements  in  our  humanity  come  to  flower 
and  fruit.  But  when  the  affections  die,  family  life 
is  like  a  cold  and  dusty  hearth  on  which  the  fire 
has  clean  gone  out.  Ideally  speaking,  the  family 
has  ceased  to  exist,  and  we  are  forced  to  ask  our- 
selves whether  the  fact  shall  be  frankly  faced,  or 
whether  the  form  of  family  life  shall  at  all  hazards 
be  preserved.  This  question  of  divorce  is  one  of 
the  most  difficult  with  which  the  moralist  is  called 
upon  to  deal,  not  because  there  is  no  distinct 
right  and  wrong  in  the  matter,  but  because  there 
are  conflicting  duties  to  be  considered  and  recon- 
ciled. The  primal  issue  is  between  the  husband 
and  wife.  Then  there  are  the  children  to  be  con- 
sidered. So  far  it  is  a  family  affair.  But  outside 
the  family  there  are  two  institutions  with  distinct 
points  of  view  and  unquestioned  powers,  —  the 
state  and  the  church.  Under  the  stress  and  strain 
of  domestic  unhappiness,  men  and  women  are 
prone  to  regard  the  issue  as  individual,  and  to 
exclude  as  unwarrantable  any  interference  from 
either  state  or  church.  Such  a  position  would  be 
morally  justifiable,  if  state  and  church  had  not 
been  concerned  in  the  establishment  of  the  family. 
In  the  majority  of  cases,  both  institutions  were 
implicated. 

In  the  solemn  crises  of  life  —  marriage,  child- 
birth, death  —  the  individual  turns  instinctively 

291 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

to  an  institution  whose  earth-life  transcends  his 
own,  and  whose  mission  it  is  to  stand  for  the 
eternal  as  opposed  to  the  transient.  He  calls  upon 
the  church  to  consecrate  his  marriage,  to  christen 
his  child,  to  bury  his  dead.  These  are  deliberate 
acts,  and  may  not  be  entered  upon  un reflectively. 
It  is  of  the  utmost  importance  that  the  church 
shall  stand  true  and  right  on  this  question  of 
divorce ;  but  that  is  not  the  present  issue.  The 
church  service  is  not  required  by  law.  It  is 
sought  voluntarily.  However  wise  or  unwise  the 
church  position  may  be,  the  man  who  invokes  the 
of&ces  of  the  church  stands  morally  committed 
to  that  position.  If  in  the  presence  of  God  and 
the  assembled  company  a  man  promises  to  take 
his  wife  for  better,  for  worse,  until  death  shall 
part,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  he  can  ever  put 
her  away  without  being  himself  forsworn.  It 
may  have  been  wrong  to  take  such  a  far-reach- 
ing vow.  It  may  have  been  wrong  for  the  church 
to  have  exacted  such  a  vow.  Morality  questions 
the  propriety  of  all  such  spiritual  mortgages. 
But  the  way  out  is  not  to  make  and  break 
them.  It  is  to  avoid  them.  The  church  may 
either  change  its  marriage  service,  or  the  indi- 
vidual may  dispense  with  the  service.  If  he 
invoke  it,  he  inevitably  accepts  the  position  on 
which  the  service  is  founded.  In  all  free  coun- 
tries, a  civil  ceremony  is  all-sufficient  to  estab- 

292 


THE    FOUR    INSTITUTIONS 


lish  the  legality  of  a  marriage.  The  relation  of  the 
church  to  family  life  is  not  official.  Where  the 
church  is  not  called  in  at  the  establishment  of 
the  family,  it  very  properly  claims  no  authority 
over  any  proposed  dissolution  of  the  family. 

The  state  position  is  more  fundamental.  For 
a  family  to  be  recognized,  it  must  have  the  sanc- 
tion of  the  state,  and  consequently  an  equally 
definite  state  sanction  is  necessary  to  dissolve  the 
family.  These  requirements  are  held  to  be  neces- 
sary by  nearly  all  moral  persons  in  order  to  safe- 
guard social  welfare.  A  community  can  suffer 
hardly  a  greater  human  disaster  than  the  capri- 
cious making  and  unmaking  of  family  life. 
While  state  regulation  may  seem  to  interfere  at 
times  with  individual  ideas  of  good  fortune,  it 
is  more  than  probable  that  the  stability  in  affec- 
tion and  duty  which  the  regulation  tends  to  set 
up  is  essential  to  the  development  of  the  high- 
est type  of  character,  and  consequently  to  the 
welfare  of  the  individual  himself.  But  state 
interference  rests  upon  more  defensible  ground 
than  this.  As  the  institute  of  rights,  the  state 
is  bound  to  look  after  the  welfare  of  the  other 
party  to  the  family  contract,  the  wife  or  the  hus- 
band who  may  not  desire  such  a  dissolution  of 
the  partnership,  and  still  more  is  the  state  bound 
to  look  out  for  the  human  and  the  property 
rights  of  the  children. 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

Extreme  individualists  of  undoubted  moral 
character,  as  well  as  sensualists  devoid  of  such 
character,  have  made  the  experiment  of  estab- 
lishing family  life  without  state  sanction.  In 
such  cases,  the  state  assumes  the  same  position 
that  the  church  does  regarding  civil  marriages. 
The  state  does  not  acknowledge  such  a  union  as 
the  basis  of  family  life,  neither  bestows  nor  with- 
holds its  sanction,  grants  no  rights  to  either 
the  woman  or  her  children,  and  continues  quite 
impartially  to  deal  with  the  members  of  such 
a  group  as  individuals.  In  thus  washing  its  hands 
of  the  whole  matter,  the  state  is  undoubtedly 
guilty  of  a  distinct  social  immorality.  The  state 
may  well  decline  to  interfere  in  the  personal  rela- 
tions of  adult  men  and  women,  but  the  uncon- 
senting  children  who  are  the  result  of  these 
relations  have  rights  quite  as  imperative  as  those 
of  the  most  respectable  legitimate  children. 

It  is  possible  for  a  man  and  a  woman  of  high 
character  to  live  together,  to  have  children,  and 
to  create  without  state  sanction  a  true  family 
which  is  at  once  moral  and  ideal.  Circumstances 
are  conceivable  under  which  this  would  be  the 
most  moral  thing  to-  do,  as,  for  example,  on  a 
desert  island,  where  there  was  neither  priest  to 
tie  the  knot  nor  state  to  declare  it  binding.  It 
is  not  the  sanction  of  any  institution  that  makes 
a  marriage  moral  or  immoral.    The  progress  of 

294 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


individual  morality  may  some  time  make  institu- 
tional sanction  of  the  family  life  superfluous. 
The  individuals  who  enter  into  marriage  are  the 
only  ones  who  can  idealize  it  and  make  it  moral. 
But  however  broadly  we  may  interpret  these 
facts,  they  do  not  remove  the  present  very  grave 
objections  to  all  irregular  family  relations.  Tak- 
ing the  unsanctioned  union  at  its  best,  —  a  pure, 
high-minded  man  and  woman,  charming  and 
beautiful  children,  —  and  it  remains  true  that 
the  example  of  such  a  family  is  socially  very 
undesirable.  Were  all  family  groups  estabHshed 
upon  the  same  high  plane,  they  would  carry 
their  own  sanction,  and  no  institutional  sanction 
would  be  necessary.  But  the  very  persons  most 
likely  to  take  advantage  of  such  an  example  are 
those  for  whom  legal  restrictions  are  most  neces- 
sary. Few  broad-minded  persons  question  the 
individual  purity  and  morality  of  George  Eliot's 
life  with  G.  H.  Lewes,  but  most  of  them  are, 
nevertheless,  obliged  to  regard  it  as  an  unfortu- 
nate example.  There  is  a  still  more  serious 
objection.  Putting  this  aspect  of  the  question 
entirely  aside,  no  high-minded  man  who  knows 
anything  of  the  world  and  its  ways  would  be 
willing  to  subject  the  woman  whom  he  cherishes 
above  all  persons  in  the  world  to  the  insults  and 
humiliations  which  a  society,  less  moral,  if  you 
please,  than  herself,  but  more  conventional,  would 

295 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

be  only  too  ready  to  heap  upon  her.  Nor  would 
he  be  willing  to  subject  his  children  to  the  seri- 
ous and  life-long  disadvantages  which,  justly  or 
unjustly,  attach  to  the  illegitimate.  The  state 
regulation  is  very  slight,  —  the  slightest  consist- 
ent with  social  safety,  —  and  does  not  interfere 
with  the  most  complete  idealization  of  family 
life.  But  were  the  burden  many  times  as  heavy,  it 
would  still  be  less  than  the  price  of  disobedience. 

The  state  regards  marriage  as  a  partnership 
and  the  family  as  a  contract.  In  South  Carolina 
no  divorce  is  permissible.  The  other  common- 
wealths of  the  republic  have  provisions  of  vary- 
ing wisdom  and  justice  for  dissolving  a  partnership 
that  proves  impossible,  and  safeguarding  as  far 
as  may  be  the  interests  of  the  children.  It  must 
be  remembered  that  the  scandals  of  the  divorce 
court  were  created  mainly  before  the  cases 
reached  that  court.  The  abuses  are  due  for  the 
most  part  to  the  varying  provisions  of  the  law 
in  our  different  commonwealths.  A  movement 
is  now  very  properly  on  foot  to  make  the  law 
uniform  throughout  America.  If  marriage  be  a 
civil  rather  than  a  religious  ceremony,  the  state 
is  quite  justified  in  both  ratifying  and  annulling 
it.  But  the  individual  who  appeals  to  the  church 
as  well  as  to  the  state  remains  morally  bound  by 
the  larger  vow. 

Any  proposed  dissolution  of  a  legal  family 
296 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


thus  involves  the  state  in  all  cases,  and  the 
church  in  the  majority  of  cases.  But  the  moral 
issue  remains  primarily  with  the  individual  man 
and  the  individual  woman,  and  is  concerned  with 
the  effect  upon  them  and  upon  the  children. 
The  most  insistent  claim  is  that  of  the  children, 
since  the  parents  who  brought  them  into  the 
world  are  bound  by  the  most  sacred  obHgations 
to  further  their  material  and  spiritual  welfare. 
In  the  majority  of  cases  this  is  better  accom- 
plished by  holding  the  family  together.  Chil- 
dren need  both  a  father's  care  and  a  mother's 
care,  and  in  most  cases  it  is  a  cruelty  to  separate 
them  from  either  parent.  Many  a  husband  and 
wife  are  held  together  by  such  considerations 
as  these.  The  children  represent  a  positive  obli- 
gation, a  deliberately  assumed  obligation,  and 
must  have  precedence  over  all  considerations  of 
the  self.  Where  there  are  no  children,  the  case 
is  much  simpler,  but  the  morality  of  separation  or 
divorce  will  still  depend  upon  the  nature  of  the 
marriage  contract,  and  upon  the  possibilities  of 
service  and  sympathy  that  may  still  exist.  Mo- 
rality can  pronounce  no  hard-and-fast  judgments 
for  or  against  dissolution.  It  depends  wholly 
upon  circumstances.  As  an  organized  mode  of 
conduct,  any  given  family  will  morally  persist 
if  it  further  the  objects  for  which  it  was  estab- 
lished, the  development   and  happiness  of  the 

297 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

father  and  mother,  the  welfare  of  the  children. 
But  the  same  family  will  morally  dissolve  just  as 
soon  as  it  becomes  evident  that  these  objects  can 
be  better  furthered  by  its  dissolution. 

The  family  touches  so  vitally  all  the  events  of 
normal  Hfe,  and  is  so  thoroughly  wrapped  up 
with  all  that  is  most  precious  in  that  life,  that 
as  a  personal  experience  it  is  happily  to  most  of 
us  a  sacred  institution,  more  sacred,  indeed,  than 
school  or  church  or  state.  But  it  is  salutary  for 
all  of  us  to  remember  that,  morally  speaking,  the 
family  is  only  a  means  to  the  unfolding  and  per- 
fecting of  the  human  spirit,  and  is  not  in  itself 
an  end.  It  is  sacred  only  as  we  ourselves,  through 
our  wise  administration  of  its  possibilities,  make 
it  sacred.  The  sole  function  of  the  family  is  to 
minister  to  the  personal,  human  needs  of  its  mem- 
bers. If  it  fail  to  do  this,  it  is  an  immoral  insti- 
tution. And  it  is  a  moral  institution  only  so  far 
as  it  makes  men  and  women  and  children  larger 
and  better  and  happier  persons.  And  finally,  as 
lovers  of  morality,  we  must  always  be  prepared 
to  welcome  any  form  of  super-family  which  with 
still  higher  ef&ciency  will  promote  the  cause  of 
human  excellence. 

The  school  is  so  much  less  intimate  and  fun- 
damental than  the  family  that  it  has  never  been 
invested  with  a  similar  sacredness.    As  ap  insti- 

298 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


tution  it  covers  all  forms  of  orsfanized  instruc- 
tion,  from  the  kindergarten  to  the  graduate 
department  of  the  university,  and  has  an  anti- 
quity almost  as  great  as  that  of  the  human  race 
itself.  The  most  primitive  cave  man  teaching  his 
children  to  fashion  implements  of  stone  was  a 
schoolmaster,  and  the  association  a  true  school. 
But  the  form  has  heen  so  flexible  and  varied 
that  we  are  prone  to  think  of  the  school  as  a 
modern  institution.  Yet  even  as  such,  where 
it  has  been  well  organized,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
public  school,  there  is  discernible  a  tendency  to 
forget  that  the  school  is  a  means,  and  to  erect  it 
into  an  end.  In  America,  our  worship  of  the 
public  school  is  proverbial.  In  some  quarters  it 
would  seem  almost  as  if  we  need  feel  no  concern 
about  public  abuses,  for  given  time,  and  the 
pubHc  school  will  mend  them  all !  But  such 
talismanic  use  of  an  institution  has  never 
been  attended  with  helpful  results.  No  one  who 
has  studied  the  influence  of  the  school  would 
willingly  behttle  its  tremendous  utility,  but  as  a 
mode  of  moral  conduct,  the  school  is  merely  a 
tool,  a  means  to  an  end,  a  part  of  the  method 
by  which  society  achieves  its  purposes.  As  such, 
the  school  must  manifest  the  two  dimensions  of 
morality,  efficiency  in  its  method  and  worth  in 
its  aim.  It  is  easier  to  attain  efficiency  than  it  is 
to  attain  worth.    The  most  penetrating  criticism 

299 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

of  the  public  school,  as  it  has  developed  in  Amer- 
ica, is  not  so  much  in  regard  to  its  efficiency  as 
it  is  in  regard  to  its  aim.  The  question  of  method 
is  always  pressing,  but  still  more  pressing  is 
the  question  as  to  what  work  the  school  is  pro- 
perly committed  to.  This  involves  much  more 
than  the  barren  details  of  schoolroom  machinery 
with  which  school,  committees  commonly  deal. 
It  involves  a  sound  philosophy  of  education, 
an  insight  into  life.  Without  this  inner  clue, 
few  discussions  are  more  time- wasting  and  soul- 
wearying  than  the  current  discussions  in  educa- 
tion. But  the  problem  of  education  becomes 
straight  and  clear  as  soon  as  it  is  handled  as  a 
moral  issue,  and  the  school  is  measured  as  con- 
duct. Whatever  else  it  may  be  in  addition,  edu- 
cation is  essentially  an  inner  process,  a  change 
of  heart,  the  revelation  of  a  world  larger  and 
more  beautiful  than  any  we  have  yet  known. 
In  a  word,  it  is  the  unfolding  and  perfecting  of 
the  human  spirit.  If  we  view  education  in  this 
large  way,  it  is  clear  that  it  is  quite  the  same 
as  that  larger  world-process  which  we  call  evolu- 
tion. It  properly  sums  up  the  totality  of  change 
wrought  in  the  human  spirit  by  the  passing  of 
the  days.  Education  cannot  in  any  absolute 
sense  be  neglected.  It  proceeds  in  spite  of  us. 
For  the  world  is  always  acting,  penetrating 
through  all  our  senses,  and  in  the  human  heart 

300 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


and  spirit  the  great  reaction  goes  on  forever,  the 
reaction  set  up  by  the  universe.  In  spite  of  bru- 
talities and  retrogressions,  the  world-process  as 
a  whole  has  meant  a  good  change  of  heart.  As 
a  broad  process,  evolution  is  operating  to  make 
our  human  world  more  human.  So  the  world 
is  the  great  schoolmaster,  and  men  and  women, 
boys  and  girls,  are  being  educated  ceaselessly 
and  inevitably.  Our  school-process  is  but  a  part 
of  this  larger  world-process,  simply  a  conscious, 
human  attempt  to  guide  evolution  more  speedily 
and  surely  to  its  apparent  goal.  No  discussion  of 
education  can  be  helpful  or  thoroughgoing  which 
does  not  recognize  this  double  aspect,  this  uncon- 
scious, natural  process  and  this  conscious,  formal 
process.  But  the  school  does  not  have  even  a 
monopoly  of  the  formal  side  of  education.  It 
shares  this  with  the  family,  the  church,  the  state, 
with  all  institutions  and  persons  that  consciously 
attempt  to  influence  mankind.  Education  has 
been  defined  as  the  art  of  persuasion.  The 
school  may  persuade  boys  and  girls,  men  and 
women,  into  the  larger  life  through  the  medium 
of  language  and  science  and  mathematics  and 
the  humanities,  but  it  is  a  part  of  human  con- 
duct, and  to  be  acceptable  and  approved  must 
make  for  the  same  human  wealth  —  for  strength 
and  beauty  and  accomplishment  and  goodness  — 
that  moral  conduct  makes  for. 

301 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

Taking  education  as  a  whole,  the  school-pro- 
cess is  considerably  the  least  important  part  of 
it.  It  is  common  to  talk  of  the  school,  and 
particularly  the  public  school,  in  exaggerated 
rhetoric.  We  never  can  take  too  keen  an  interest 
in  its  welfare.  But  we  must  always  remember 
that  human  life  is  a  unit  experience.  Until  fam- 
ily relations  and  daily  work  and  adult  ambitions 
have  been  moralized  and  idealized,  the  school 
can  attain  no  real  moral  efficiency.  The  present 
trend  in  American  life  is  to  place  the  emphasis 
upon  things,  not  persons.  So  long  as  this  is 
true,  the  school-process  will  be  mechanical  and 
material,  and  will  not  make  for  human  integrity. 
An  adult  world  given  over  to  the  pursuit  of 
unworthy  ends  cannot  possibly  frame  a  w^orthy 
school-process,  for  it  lacks  the  necessary  insight. 
But  even  if  it  could,  the  process  would  be  inef- 
fectual. With  the  school  teaching  one  set  of 
ideals,  and  social  life  another  set,  there  grows 
up  quite  inevitably  a  confusion  and  insincerity 
barren  of  good  fruit. 

In  America  we  have  developed  three  types  of 
lower  school,  —  the  state  school,  the  church 
school,  and  the  private,  non-sectarian  school. 
They  are  in  a  way  competing  institutions,  but 
it  is  only  fair  to  say  that  the  terms  of  the  com- 
petition are  hardly  equal.  The  state  school  is 
supported  by  taxation,  but  the  church  and  the 

302 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


private  school  are  supported  by  individuals  who 
have  already  contributed  their  share  towards  the 
support  of  the  state  school.  It  is  only  fair  to  re- 
member this  condition  in  trying  to  estimate  the 
moral  worth  of  the  different  types  of  school.  It 
may  account  in  part  for  the  fact  that  in  America 
the  state  schools  taken  as  a  whole  are  probably 
superior  to  the  church  schools  and  private  schools 
taken  as  a  whole.  Yet  the  three  types  have  their 
contributions  to  make  towards  the  general  wel- 
fare, and  to  our  body  of  educational  knowledge. 
The  moral  argument  for  a  state  school  rests 
upon  the  very  proper  consideration  that  society 
owes  at  least  an  elementary  education  to  all  its 
children,  owes  them  the  freedom  of  opportunity 
which  this  equipment  supplies.  And  it  rests  upon 
the  ground  that  only  through  education  can  a 
society  achieve  material  prosperity  and  artistic 
distinction.  But  the  question  as  to  whether  these 
admittedly  excellent  purposes  can  best  be  accom- 
plished by  a  free  state  school  is  of  course  open 
to  debate.  It  depends  upon  our  conception  of 
the  function  of  the  state.  Whatever  the  final 
decision,  it  is  wholesome  to  remember  that  the 
state  school  is  good  only  as  we  make  it  good. 
As  a  practical  result,  a  state  school,  like  a  state 
church,  does  tend  to  become  mechanical,  and  to 
lose  some  of  the  vitality  and  adaptability  inher- 
ent in  less  completely  organized  bodies.    That  a 

303 


,,^      OF  THE 

OF 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

state  school  is  under  all  circumstances  an  un- 
qualified blessing  is,  I  think,  too  unreflectively 
taken  for  granted,  and  prevents  our  making  the 
institution  the  useful  social  agent  which  it  is 
capable  of  becoming. 

The  church  schools  have  been  established  for 
two  reasons,  —  a  narrow  reason  and  a  broad  rea- 
son. To  hold  and  win  children  for  the  given 
denomination  is  the  narrow  reason,  and  has  little 
in  common  with  the  universality  of  morality. 
To  teach  by  approved  pedagogical  methods  the 
righteousness  and  morality  apparently  left  out  of 
the  curriculum  of  the  state  school  is  the  broad 
reason,  and  has  much  to  commend  it.  In  point 
of  seriousness,  the  moral  equipment  of  a  nation 
is  far  more  important  than  its  technical  and 
formal  training.  If  it  were  a  choice  between 
righteousness  and  the  limited  educational  advan- 
tages offered  by  the  state  schools,  no  earnest  man 
would  hesitate  to  choose  righteousness.  In  the 
opinion  of  many  competent  persons,  America  is 
more  in  need  of  righteousness  just  now  than  of 
anything  else.  It  may  well  be  that,  by  its  insist- 
ence upon  this  need,  the  church  school  will 
deepen  the  emphasis  already  coming  to  be  laid 
upon  moral  instruction  in  the  state  school,  and 
so  make  itself  unnecessary. 

The  private  school  probably  offers  the  ex- 
tremes  in  American    secondary   education,  the 

304 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


very  best  that  we  have  and  the  very  worst.  This 
comes  about  from  the  freedom  of  the  conditions. 
Any  one,  whatever  his  equipment,  may  set  up 
a  private  school.  The  financial  rewards  are  too 
small  to  ^attract  mere  adventurers,  but  it  is  the 
financial  question  that  commonly  brings  ship- 
wreck. The  majority  of  school  proprietors  may 
not  be  wise,  but  they  are,  as  a  class,  singularly 
high-minded.  There  is  commonly  no  failure  in 
good  motive.  Some  of  our  poorest  schools  un- 
doubtedly started  out  with  essentially  ideal  objects 
in  view.  The  failure  to  realize  them  is  due  in  part 
to  inefficiency  on  the  part  of  the  head-master  or 
his  assistants,  a  lack  of  practical  executive  power, 
but  it  is  due  in  even  larger  part  to  an  economic 
reason,  and  this  is  particularly  true  of  the  day 
school.  Such  a  school  has  fixed  geographical 
limitations.  It  can  draw  its  scholars  only  from  a 
somewhat  narrow  territory.  The  more  enthusias- 
tic and  devoted  the  head-master,  the  more  prone 
is  he  to  spend  everything  he  has  on  equipment, 
even  to  go  into  debt.  To  keep  the  enterprise 
afloat,  he  is  obliged  to  have  a  fair,  even  a  large 
number  of  scholars,  and  quite  before  he  knows 
it,  he  is  in  the  position  of  a  man  bidding  for 
scholars.  This  means  that  he  ceases  to  be  a  pro- 
fessional leader,  and  is  soon  offering  the  sort  of 
education  demanded  by  a  non-professional  body, 
the   parents.    The  parental  idea  is  a  somewhat 

305 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

curious  mixture,  compounded  of  memories  of  an 
old-time  school  supposed  to  be  good  because  it 
produced  their  own  excellent  selves,  and  the  latest 
educational  rumor  picked  up  from  the  newspaper 
or  at  the  club.  This  home  pressure  is  so  great 
that,  as  we  all  know,  in  many  struggling  private 
schools,  and  even  in  some  highly  prosperous 
ones,  it  is  the  parents,  or  even  the  children  them- 
selves, who  decide  the  curriculum,  and  not  the 
master.  The  moral  schoolmaster  must  be  some- 
what autocratic.  He  has  no  business  to  teach 
unless  he  know  more  about  such  matters  than 
either  parent  or  child.  He  must  take  the  same 
position  that  a  self-respecting  physician  takes,  and 
consent  to  act  only  where  his  prescriptions  are 
followed.  If  such  confidence  does  not  exist,  no 
moral  cooperation  between  master  and  parent  is 
possible. 

The  boarding-school  has  two  marked  advan- 
tages over  the  day  school ;  first,  there  are  no  geo- 
graphical limitations,  since  boys  can  come  from 
all  over  the  country,  even  all  over  the  world,  and 
secondly,  the  boys  are  resident,  but  their  parents 
are  not.  This  makes  it  possible  for  a  skillful  mas- 
ter to  offer  an  ideal  scheme  of  education,  and  to 
feel  reasonably  certain  that  over  such  a  wide  ter- 
ritory he  will  find  a  sufficient  number  of  appre- 
ciative parents  to  make  his  school  self-supporting, 
without  those   immoral  compromises  which  are 

306 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


unavoidably  involved  when  he  feels  himself  forced 
to  bid  for  boys.  There  is  also  less  opportunity 
for  home  interference. 

But  parents  are  not  the  only  obstructionists. 
Trustees  of  acute  conscientiousness  and  no  peda- 
gogical training  are  even  more  fatal  to  good 
work.  I  am  disposed  to  think  that  an  ideal 
school  requires,  in  addition  to  great  ability  on 
the  part  of  the  master,  three  very  practical  con- 
ditions, —  no  trustees,  complete  ownership  by 
the  master,  an  establishment  so  simple  that  it  can 
be  run  financially  without  any  scholars.  These 
were  the  conditions  under  which  Buddha  and 
Plato  and  Jesus  taught. 

The  best  private  school  is  necessarily  better 
than  the  best  state  school.  The  latter  cannot 
rise  much  above  the  average  level  of  the  com- 
munity, but  the  former  has  almost  unbounded 
freedom,  and  if  untainted  by  profit  hunger  can 
be  a  veritable  light  in  dark  places.  It  is  indeed 
the  high  opportunity  of  the  private  school  to 
point  the  way  for  other  schools,  and  to  carry  out 
those  valuable  experiments  in  education  which 
are  less  possible  for  church  and  state  institutions. 

As  an  institution,  the  church  has  had  a  his- 
tory so  rich  and  voluminous  that  any  attempt  to 
deal  with  its  morality  within  the  limits  of^a  few 
pages  must  seem  not  only  inadequate,  but  afeo 

307 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

presumptuous.  It  is  older  than  any  family,  how- 
ever historic ;  it  has  outlived  every  state.  The 
church  comes  to  us  venerable  in  years;  laden 
with  traditions ;  speaking  of  a  life  which  tran- 
scends the  present ;  guardian  of  sacred  rites  and 
mysteries.  It  is  impossible  to  be  insensible  to 
the  claims  of  so  august  an  institution,  august  in 
spite  of  the  crimes  which  have  been  committed 
in  its  name.  As  the  historic  institute  of  duty, 
the  church  has  entered  the  inner  recesses  of  the 
spirit,  and  has  spoken  the  words  of  action  and 
renunciation,  of  forgiveness  and  condemnation, 
of  life  and  of  death.  More  intimately  than  the 
family  or  the  school  or  the  state,  the  church 
has  addressed  itself  to  the  individual  conscience, 
and  so  has  gained  a  dominion  over  the  machinery 
of  action  not  won  by  any  exterior  force.  In 
inciting  men  to  acts  of  high  devotion  and  self- 
sacrifice,  as  well  as  to  deeds  of  perjury  and 
cruelty,  the  power  of  the  church  has  been  terri- 
ble. In  all  countries  and  all  ages  this  power  has 
been  and  is  exerted,  both  for  good  and  for  evil. 
It  has  been  a  singular  history  of  mingled  light 
and  darkness. 

To  a  multitude  of  devout  persons,  the  church 
is  not  this  frail  and  human  institution,  but  is 
immaculate,  infallible,  sacred.  The  crimes  which 
have  attended  its  history  have  been  the  mis- 
takes of  its  individual  ministers,  and  as  repug- 

308 


THE    FOUR    INSTITUTIONS 


nant  to  it  as  to  us.  That  is  to  say,  the  real 
church  is  an  ideal  institution,  of  which  we  see 
but  a  faint  reflection  in  the  human  institution 
known  to  us.  Morality  has  no  quarrel  with  this 
position.  The  ideal  church,  Hke  the  ideal  family 
and  the  ideal  school,  is  a  sacred  institution,  whose 
existence,  even  in  the  shadow  realm  of  the  spirit, 
has  made  possible  such  light  and  glory  as  has 
been  the  portion  of  the  actual  church  on  earth. 

But  morality,  as  a  helpful  criticism  of  human 
conduct,  must  concern  itself  wholly  with  the 
thing  that  is,  and  must  take  account  of  the 
actual  weakness  as  well  as  the  actual  strength. 
So  judged,  the  church  of  to-day  is  part  moral 
and  part  immoral.  It  is  moral  as  it  holds  up  to 
the  individual  the  vision  of  a  higher,  attainable 
life  than  he  has  yet  known ;  as  it  speaks  to  him 
of  the  sacred  compulsion  of  duty,  and  instructs 
him  truly  in  what  duty  is ;  as  it  touches  his  heart 
through  its  services,  its  beauty,  its  music,  to  a 
greater  reverence  and  a  deeper  love ;  as  it  min- 
isters to  the  poor  and  the  sick  and  the  unfortu- 
nate ;  as  it  gives  everything  and  asks  nothing. 
To  look  upon  the  church  in  this  way  is  to  regard 
it  in  its  true  moral  character  as  a  means  and  not 
as  an  end,  and  its  morality  will  depend  upon  its 
efficiency  in  furthering  the  social  purpose,  the 
production  of  a  more  excellent  humanity.  And 
the  church  is  immoral  as  it  sets  itself  up  as  an 

309 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

end,  asking,  where  it  ought  to  be  giving ;  as  it 
offers  an  ideal  of  life  at  once  unattainable  and 
inconsistent  with  the  best  earth-life  of  humanity ; 
as  it  creates  artificial  and  childish  duties,  and 
obscures  vital  and  fundamental  ones ;  as  it  de- 
velops a  ceremonial  so  elaborate  as  to  be  the 
substitute  for  good  deeds ;  as  it  fails  to  minister 
to  the  needy  and  to  put  them  practically  in  the 
way  of  a  better  and  a  happier  life. 

The  most  far-reaching  criticism  of  the  church 
that  morality  has  to  offer  is  just  this  charge  of 
inversion,  that  the  church  has  come  to  look  upon 
itself  as  an  end,  with  requirements,  privileges, 
revenues,  servants,  when  in  reality  it  has  no 
excuse  for  being,  save  in  its  own  power  to  serve, 
when  in  reality  the  feeblest  child  playing  on  its 
doorstep,  the  meanest  sinner  kneeling  at  its  altar, 
is  more  mighty  than  it,  is  the  genuine  end  for 
which  this  elaborate  machinery  exists.  But  this 
is  the  fatal  weakness  in  all  institutions.  The 
family,  school,  church,  and  state  all  tend  to  take 
themselves  more  seriously  than  they  tend  to  take 
their  proper  functions.  If,  in  the  course  of  social 
evolution,  these  institutions  should  ever  disap- 
pear, one  may  venture  the  prediction  that  it  will 
not  be  because  their  high  functions  have  ceased 
to  be  valued,  but  rather  because  the  institutions 
themselves  have  ceased  to  perform  their  func- 
tions, have  ceased  to  serve.    And  whether  we 

310 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


will  or  not,  these  institutions  are  all  on  trial,  are 
being  judged  by  their  fruits,  are  being  found 
wanting  or  not  wanting.  It  remains  for  those 
who  beheve  them  essential  to  the  enginery  of  the 
good  life  to  justify  their  belief. 

Viewing  the  church  in  this  fashion,  as  servant 
instead  of  master,  it  is  clear  that  the  church  has 
no  moral  claim  upon  the  individual.  There  can 
be  no  valid  duty  of  church-going.  Whether  we 
go  to  church,  or  whether  we  refrain  from  going 
to  church,  is  indeed  a  moral  act,  but  its  morality 
does  not  depend  upon  any  claim  of  the  church  as 
an  institution.  It  depends  solely,  as  in  the  case 
of  all  other  human  conduct,  upon  the  results. 
If  going  to  church  betters  me  personally,  it  is  an 
advantage  which  I  may  not  morally  forego.  To 
remain  at  home — other  things  being  equal  — 
would  be  to  be  guilty  of  the  immorality  of  the 
second-best.  If,  on  the  whole,  the  ministrations 
of  the  church  better  the  community,  it  is  a  privi- 
lege to  support  it  which  I  may  not  morally  omit. 
But  the  question  may  not  be  decided  in  any  off- 
hand, hard-and-fast  way.  The  question  is  indi- 
vidual and  special.  It  depends  upon  a  hundred 
things,  upon  the  particular  church  at  hand,  upon 
the  temperament,  the  day's  mood  and  needs,  the 
occupations  of  the  week,  the  home  duties  and 
advantages,  the  alternatives  of  every  sort.  In  a 
word,  the  church  is  an  optional  rather  than  a 

311  .       * 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

necessary  institution.  A  man  may  morally  elect 
it  or  decline  it,  just  as  he  elects  or  declines  that 
more  immediate  family  life  which  follows  upon 
marriage  and  parenthood.  Neither  decision  is 
in  itself  moral  or  immoral.  The  morahty  of  the 
action  depends  upon  whether  or  not  it  brings 
the  greater  good  fortune.  Personally,  I  am  very 
glad  to  have  been  brought  up  in  that  church 
which  '  has  ever  been  the  conserver  of  reverence 
and  good  taste.'  And  I  should  wish  my  chil- 
dren, if  I  have  any,  to  come  under  the  same 
poetic  and  inspiring  influences.  But  I  find  my 
neighbor  no  less  moral  because  he  declines  this 
symbolism,  and  prefers  to  remain  at  home,  a 
member  of  that  invisible  church  which  knows 
neither  time  nor  space,  and  is  made  up  of  all 
faithful  and  open  souls. 

A  church  stands  commonly  for  both  faith  and 
works,  and  both  faith  and  works  are  open  to 
moral  judgment.  The  first  requisite  of  any  faith 
is  that  it  shall  be  sincere.  If  it  fail  to  be  this, 
it  is  as  detestable  as  any  other  form  of  lying ; 
more  detestable  in  fact,  since  it  implies  a  rotten- 
ness at  the  very  heart  of  things.  A  live  faith 
is  dynamic.  It  cannot  stand  still.  It  is  bound 
to  pass  from  lower  levels  to  higher  levels.  The 
objection  to  a  too  rigid  creed  is  that  it  makes 
insufficient  provision  for  this  growth  in  grace. 
It  forces  a  man  out  of  the  church,  or  it  brings 

312 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


upon  him  the  far  graver  disaster  of  forcing  him 
into  hypocrisy.  By  its  very  nature,  faith  can- 
not be  prescribed.  It  is  not  what  a  man  would 
beheve,  but  what  he  must,  as  the  result  of  his 
own  individual,  spiritual  experience.  Happily,  no 
institution  can  prescribe  a  man's  experience.  If 
it  could,  the  world  would  be  a  much  duller  place 
than  it  is.  Failing  to  do  this,  no  institution  can 
logically  prescribe  a  man's  faith.  Such  a  posi- 
tion is  not  causational,  and  therefore  not  moral. 

At  its  inception,  any  special  church,  not  pro- 
mulgated by  force,  tends  to  be  sincere,  moral, 
and  vital.  It  attracts  to  itself  a  body  of  persons 
who  believe  practically  the  same  thing.  This 
community  of  belief  is  the  very  occasion  of  their 
coming  together.  It  is  natural  to  formulate  this 
belief  into  a  creed.  If  the  terms  be  general  and 
flexible  enough,  the  church  may  remain  sincere 
and  vital  over  many  generations.  But  sooner  or 
later,  some  limitation  is  reached.  Higher  con- 
ceptions have  supplanted  lower  conceptions.  It 
is  no  longer  possible  for  the  best  souls  to  sub- 
scribe to  the  outgrown  creed.  Under  our  present 
administration  of  the  special  church,  this  best 
blood  of  the  church  passes  out  from  its  midst, 
and  there  are  left  those  poorer  souls  troubled 
neither  with  spiritual  doubts  nor  spiritual  life. 

There  are  two  ways  of  regarding  such  a  situa- 
tion.   Individually,  the  disaster  to  the  man  who 

313 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

comes  out  may  not  be  very  great.  If  the  church 
have  brought  the  individual  to  such  a  point  that 
he  can  stand  by  himself,  face  to  face  with  the 
eternities,  and  pass  on  to  higher  levels,  the  church 
may  for  him  have  performed  its  function,  and 
be  no  longer  needed.  But  there  will  always 
remain  a  well-founded  doubt  as  to  whether  the 
church,  had  it  been  truly  catholic,  might  not  have 
helped  the  individual  to  still  greater  heights. 
And  then  there  is  the  other  point,  the  social  con- 
sideration. A  moral  church  must  be  efficient,  and 
it  must  hold  up  the  highest  attainable  ideal  of 
earthly  life.  It  can  do  this  only  through  indi- 
viduals. It  is  bound  to  fail  in  efficiency  and  in 
the  progressive  worth  of  its  ideals,  if  it  so  con- 
stantly and  remorselessly  squeeze  out  of  its  own 
body  the  very  persons  best  qualified  to  realize  its 
purposes. 

The  situation  comes  down  to  this,  that  a  fixed 
creed  means  either  a  sincere,  brilliant  church 
that  is  transient ;  or  a  hypocritical,  dull  church 
that  is  permanent.  Neither  alternative  is  mor- 
ally tolerable,  if  the  church  is  to  be  that  insti- 
tution of  high  human  service  which  our  ideal 
of  the  church  warrants  us  in  believing  that  it 
may  be.  The  way  out,  from  a  moral  point  of 
view,  is  the  furtherance  of  a  church,  devoid  of 
a  fixed  creed,  allowing  the  utmost  freedom  of 
belief  to  its  members,  standing  above  all  things 

314 


THE    FOUR  INSTITUTIONS 


for  efficient  human  service,  preaching  the  best 
spiritual  ideals  of  the  time,  but  always  pointing 
resolutely  beyond  them  to  the  more  glorious 
vision  of  to-morrow. 

Beliefs  as  modes  of  conduct  are  open  to  inde- 
pendent moral  judgment.  They  are  good  or  bad 
as  they  make  for  or  against  human  excellence. 
A  large  belief  in  the  matter  of  the  eternities 
tends  to  make  a  larger  person,  just  as  a  cramped 
faith  makes  for  littleness.  But  this  is  no  argu- 
ment for  illusion.  The  moral  man  wants  to  see 
things  as  they  are,  even  though  what  he  sees  has 
in  it  the  elements  of  tragedy.  No  belief  is  good 
simply  because  its  immediate  effect  is  comfort- 
ing; for  life  being  a  unit,  a  single  stream  of  con- 
sciousness, any  lack  of  verity  contaminates  the 
whole.  But  the  effort  to  see  things  as  they  are 
is  necessarily  limited  to  the  knowable.  If  within 
this  wide  domain  could  be  found  adequate  ex- 
planation of  human  life,  of  the  world,  of  nature, 
the  human  spirit  might  rest  content  with  such 
a  realism.  But  failing  any  explanation,  the  alert 
spirit  turns  to  things  as  they  may  be,  and  in  this 
transcendental  world  endeavors  to  create  that 
body  of  probable  or  possible  truth  needed  to  com- 
plete and  rationalize  the  actual  experience  of  the 
present.  It  would  seem  that  there  must  always 
be  this  fundamental  mystery  in  all  finite  life. 
To  hold  the  spirit  back  from  these  voyages  of 

315 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

discovery  would  be  to  limit  quite  inexcusably  the 
field  of  the  spiritual  life.  To  dwell  too  persist- 
ently upon  the  transcendental  may  easily  mean 
the  withdrawal  of  interest  from  the  wholesome 
problems  of  daily  life,  and  the  neglect  of  its  most 
obvious  duties.  But  to  ignore  the  transcendental 
side,  and  count  the  story  of  actual  experience  in 
the  three-dimensional  world  a  complete  story  of 
life,  is  to  go  over  to  a  materiaHsm  which  is  neither 
satisfying  nor  fruitful.  By  holding  before  us  in 
a  large  and  flexible  way  the  genuine  mystery  of 
life,  and  avoiding  all  '  man-made  mystifications,' 
the  church  may  render  noble  service  to  society 
by  enlarging  the  boundaries  of  the  individual 
spiritual  life. 

As  we  have  seen,  the  family  is  a  creation  of 
the  state,  and  without  state  sanction  has  no  ofii- 
cial  existence.  It  is  sometimes  the  joint  creation 
of  the  state  and  the  church.  The  school  is  cap- 
able of  independent  life,  but  in  most  civilized 
countries  it  is  largely  in  the  hands  of  the  state, 
somewhat  in  the  hands  of  the  church.  In  Amer- 
ica, church  and  state  are  not  only  independent, 
but  we  are  even  jealous  of  anything  more  than 
the  most  transient  cooperation.  In  Europe  and 
Asia  we  have  the  phenomenon  of  the  established 
church,  in  some  cases  church  and  state  working 
together  as  one  institution.  In  many  ways  the 
argument  for  a  state  church  is  quite  as  strong 

316 


THE   FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


as  the  argument  for  a  state  school.  Yet  the  trend 
of  liberal  opinion  is  undoubtedly  towards  a  state 
school  and  away  from  a  state  church.  Where  the 
state  church  stands  for  specific  beliefs,  for  a  fixed 
creed,  as  nearly  all  historic  churches  do,  it  seems 
manifestly  unjust  to  exact  financial  support,  still 
more  unjust  to  exact  spiritual  obedience,  from 
those  who  do  not  accept  such  a  creed.  On  the 
ground  of  social  welfare,  there  is  much  to  be 
said  for  a  national  church,  without  fixed  creed, 
committed  solely  to  social  service  and  the  reality 
of  the  spiritual  life. 

The  cardinal  virtue  of  society  is  freedom.  To 
achieve  this  is  the  full  measure  of  the  law.  As 
the  institute  of  rights,  the  supreme  function  of 
the  state  is  to  assure  each  man,  woman,  and 
child  within  its  borders  of  the  largest  possible 
measure  of  freedom.  It  is  the  more  permissible  to 
select  a  cardinal  virtue  for  society,  if  the  chosen 
virtue  be  not  only  fundamental  in  itself,  but  also 
capable  of  a  progressive  interpretation  that  will 
enable  it  to  keep  pace  with  our  enlarging  con- 
ception of  morality.  Freedom  is  precisely  such 
a  virtue.  It  not  only  sums  up  what  a  man  be- 
lieves to  be  his  fundamental  social  right,  but  it  is 
susceptible  of  a  progressive  interpretation  which 
allows  the  state  to  be  a  dynamic  and  therefore 
a  moral  institution.    The  morality  of  any  state 

317 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

may  be  accurately  gauged  by  the  amount  of 
freedom  which  it  has  secured  for  its  people.  It 
would  be  a  difficult,  but  perfectly  possible  task 
to  arrange  the  contemporary  states  of  the  world 
in  a  descending  scale  of  moralities.  And  the 
curious  feature  of  such  an  arrangement  would  be 
that  the  essential  morality  of  the  state  would  not 
rest  wholly  upon  the  political  form  of  its  gov- 
ernment. All  the  republics  would  not  be  found 
among  the  sheep  as  a  matter  of  necessity,  nor  all 
the  monarchies  among  the  goats.  It  is  a  matter 
of  history,  the  number  of  crimes  which  have 
been  committed  in  the  name  of  this  sacred  thing, 
human  freedom. 

Social  welfare  depends  upon  the  freedom  of 
the  individual  to  work  out  his  own  good  fortune. 
It  is  the  condition  of  morality,  and  therefore  the 
fundamental  virtue  of  the  moral  state.  But  free- 
dom, as  we  have  seen,  has  a  double  aspect,  the 
freedom  of  non-interference,  and  the  freedom 
of  opportunity.  The  one  is  negative,  the  police 
function.  The  other  is  positive,  the  social  func- 
tion. It  is  not  necessary  to  say  which  is  the 
more  important,  since  both  are  essential  to  suc- 
cess. Neither  function  is  very  fruitful  of  human 
welfare,  if  the  other  function  be  omitted.  A 
state  which  did  nothing  but  cry  '  Hands  off  ! ' 
would  offer,  at  best,  a  very  barren  sort  of  free- 
dom ;  just  as  a  state  which  devoted  itself  to  the 

318 


THE   FOUR  INSTITUTIONS 


socialistic  activities  of  opportunity,  while  it  al- 
lowed the  individual  to  be  badgered  and  coerced, 
would  be  a  very  miserable  moral  failure.  Inter- 
preted broadly  enough,  either  function  really 
includes  the  other.  Non-interference  means,  in  a 
large  way,  not  only  the  non-interference  of  per- 
sons and  institutions,  but  also  the  non-interfer- 
ence of  events,  —  of  time  and  space,  hunger  and 
cold  and  nakedness,  disease  and  poverty,  fire 
and  water,  —  in  a  word,  that  essential  non-inter- 
ference of  what  we  have  called  the  tyranny  of 
things.  Since  more  persons,  infinitely  more,  have 
perished  from  disease  and  famine  and  natural 
calamities  than  from  the  total  violence  of  a  not- 
too-gentle  world,  it  is  not  fanciful  to  urge  that 
the  police  function  might  properly  be  exercised 
against  these  combined  foes  with  as  much  en- 
thusiasm and  efficiency  as  against  more  visible 
and  corporal  assailants. 

In  the  same  way  it  is  proper  to  urge  that  the 
freedom  of  opportunity  is  a  very  idle  phrase  in- 
deed, unless  it  include,  as  the  very  first  oppor- 
tunity of  all,  the  opportunity  of  free  choice  and 
volition.  The  vision  of  a  social  state  which 
omitted  the  primal  morality  of  individual  free- 
dom could  not  be  saved  by  any  amount  of  or- 
ganization and  benevolence  from  being  in  reality 
the  vision  of  a  well- developed  tyranny.  This  is 
sometimes,  ag  we  have  seen,  the  defect  in  that 

319 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

smaller  group,  the  family,  and  in  that  larger 
group,  the  church.  It  is  the  essential  defect  in 
those  socialistic  dreams  in  which  a  supposed 
social  welfare  is  allowed  to  ride  rough-shod  over 
such  little  matters  as  individual  preferences  and 
desires.  It  is  curious  that  the  myth  of  Procrustes, 
so  grotesque  in  itself,  should  have  a  world-wide 
and  time- wide  application.  Publicists,  moralists, 
religionists,  alike  seem  subject  to  the  malady  of 
wanting  to  make  us  all  fit  the  same  bed. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  negative  function  of 
the  state,  the  police  function,  is  badly  carried  out 
the  world  over,  and  not  least  badly  in  America. 
Life  and  property  and  spiritual  integrity  are 
far  too  subject  to  attack.  There  are  few  local- 
ities where  it  is  perfectly  safe  to  venture  abroad 
late  at  night.  There  are  still  fewer  localities 
where  it  is  safe  to  leave  one's  house  unlocked, 
or  one's  wife  and  daughters  unguarded.  There 
are  few  communities  in  which  the  frank  avowal 
of  an  opinion  greatly  at  variance  with  current 
public  opinion  is  not  attended  by  unpleasant  per- 
sonal results.  In  those  smaller  matters  of  dispute 
which  must  be  taken  to  law  for  their  settlement, 
there  is  no  great  assurance  of  justice.  The  pre- 
sence of  paid  advocates  in  our  courts  too  often 
makes  the  issue  depend  upon  a  battle  of  the  wits. 
It  is  not  necessary  to  multiply  details.  The  fact 
remains  that  as  an  experience,  the  freedom  of 

320 


THE  FOUR  INSTITUTIONS 


non-interference,  even  in  a  country  which  prides 
itself  on  its  freedom,  is  still  a  very  Hmited  and 
imperfect  morality.  As  this  is  the  primary  and 
essential  element  in  all  state  morahty,  there  is 
at  least  color  for  the  contention  that  a  state 
which  has  not  attained  this  elementary  achieve- 
ment cannot  profitably  turn  its  attention  to 
those  more  complicated  moralities  which  present 
themselves  under  the  head  of  opportunity.  It  is 
much  like  indulging  in  charity  before  one  has 
paid  one's  just  debts.  ^  Hands  off  ! '  taken  alone, 
is  doubtless  a  very  Hmited  programme,  but  as  a 
first  and  necessary  step  in  state  morality,  it  is  a 
tremendous  achievement,  and  an  achievement 
which  may  not  be  omitted  for  the  sake  of  more 
brilliant  pyrotechnics. 

Granting  a  state  this  large  achievement,  the 
attainment  of  non-interference  in  the  more  ob- 
vious affairs  of  life,  the  more  profound  morality 
of  opportunity  opens  so  unending  a  vista  that 
one  might  well  desire  for  such  a  state  an  immor- 
tality not  yet  achieved  by  any  historic  state.  The 
large  benefits  which  accrue  from  organized  and 
united  effort  are  now  too  well  recognized  to  need 
further  argument  in  their  behalf.  The  state  is 
such  an  effort  on  the  largest  possible  scale,  a 
corporation  which  includes  every  individual  on 
terms  of  approximate  equality.  The  possibilities 
in  such  an  organization  are  practically  unlimited. 

321 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

A  morality  which  insists  upon  the  first-best  as 
the  only  permissible  ideal  enjoins  a  ceaseless 
activity  in  the  exploitation  and  conquest  of  new 
possibilities.  The  morality  of  opportunity,  al- 
ready touched  upon  in  the  chapter  on  Social  Wel- 
fare, means  the  annihilation  of  all  that  hinders 
the  human  spirit,  and  the  multiphcation  of  all 
that  helps  it.  What  we  are  after  is  not  a  toler- 
able life,  but  the  very  best  that  the  best  of  us 
can  see  and  grasp ;  something  magnificent  in  its 
sweep  and  power.  We  shall  the  more  readily 
realize  this  vision  as  the  state  becomes  for  us 
an  instrument  of  the  splendor  of  life,  and  not 
merely  a  large  policeman.  But  morality  regards 
not  only  these  splendid  ends  of  social  activity, 
but  also  the  processes.  Those  who  have  high 
hope  of  the  social  function  of  the  state  must 
scrutinize  with  equal  care  the  morality  of  its 
methods.  It  is  not  the  greatest  good  of  the 
greatest  number,  regardless  of  the  claims  of 
the  minority.  That  is  an  out-and-out  immoral- 
ity, the  too  abundant  immorality  of  all  majority 
rule.  The.  opportunities  must  be  offered,  not 
forced  ;  must  be  paid  for  by  those  who  use  them, 
not  by  those  who  decline  them.  For  every  oppor- 
tunity offered  by  the  state  has  been  achieved  at 
the  cost  of  human  effort,  and  must  be  paid  for 
by  some  one.  In  speaking  of  state  activities  and 
state  duties,  it  is  easy  to  forget  this  practical  side 

322 


THE    FOUR   INSTITUTIONS 


of  the  matter,  and  to  speak  as  if  the  state,  were 
it  sufficiently  socialized,  could  feed  and  clothe 
and  shelter  and  educate  and  amuse  and  redeem 
its  people  out  of  its  own  good-will  and  creative 
fertility.  But  the  fact  is,  thai  while  the  state  can 
accomplish  things  quite  beyond  the  reach  of  the 
individual,  and  at  a  cost  less  than  others,  the  cost 
is  nevertheless  there,  and  must  be  met.  The 
moral  problem  is  to  get  the  utmost  social  advan- 
tage at  the  least  cost,  and  to  apportion  the  cost 
quite  justly  among  the  actual  beneficiaries. 

There  is,  of  course,  a  large  way  of  looking  at 
this  social  function  of  the  state  which  makes  the 
advantage  of  any  considerable  body  of  persons 
the  advantage  of  the  whole  community,  by  rea- 
son of  the  general  heightening  of  the  national 
life  which  is  thus  brought  about.  It  is  easy 
on  such  grounds  for  Great  Britain  to  justify 
the  state  support  of  the  Anglican  Church.  Any 
given  Englishman  may  fail  to  admire  its  services 
or  to  attend  them,  may  indeed  be  supporting  a 
non-conformist  chapel  round  the  corner,  but  he 
nevertheless  gets  an  ample  return  for  his  church 
rates,  says  the  state,  in  the  general  decency  and 
morality  and  prosperity  which  follow  upon  the 
ministrations  of  the  establishment,  and  make 
his  own  good  fortune  much  more  expansive 
and  agreeable  than  could  be  the  case  without 
this  national  safeguard.    It  is  easy  on  the  same 

323 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

grounds  to  justify  our  own  large  expenditures 
for  the  public  school.  I  may  have  no  children  of 
my  own,  or  if  I  have,  may  prefer  to  send  them 
to  a  private  school,  but  nevertheless,  says  the 
state,  I  get  full  return  for  all  the  school  tax  I 
may  pay,  in  the  general  increase  in  social  welfare 
and  social  morality  which  results  from  the  dif- 
fusion of  education.  On  quite  the  same  ground, 
the  general  good,  the  state  defends  all  its  multi- 
tudinous expenditures  for  highways,  lighting, 
water- works,  boards  of  health,  charities,  river 
and  harbor  improvements,  lighthouses,  scientific 
bureaux,  geological  surveys,  and  the  like.  It 
may  happen  that  very  few  of  these  activities 
touch  me  directly,  but  I  share  the  general  wel- 
fare to  which  they  are  contributing  causes,  and 
may  properly  be  called  upon  to  pay  my  propor- 
tion of  their  support. 

This  argument  of  social  welfare  is  a  very  po- 
tent one.  It  appeals  particularly  to  persons  who 
have  lived  in  a  highly  socialized  community  like 
Switzerland  or  Massachusetts,  and  have  after- 
wards experienced  the  less  socialized  life  of  the 
frontier.  No  socially-minded  person  would  have 
the  state  withdraw  from  these  most  important 
functions  of  opportunity.  On  the  contrary,  one 
would  wish  the  utmost  expansion  of  these  liber- 
ating functions.  '  We  are  all  socialists  now.' 
The  social  ideal  is  a  community  freed  from  the 

324 


THE   FOUR  INSTITUTIONS 


tyranny  of  things,  and  at  liberty  to  lead  the  Hfe 
of  the  spirit.  The  extreme  programme  of  social- 
ism is  in  exact  accord  with  morality,  so  far  as 
this  programme  proposes,  at  the  least  possible 
expenditure,  to  feed  and  clothe  and  shelter  man- 
kind, to  annihilate  time  and  space  by  means  of 
approved  methods  of  transportation  and  commu- 
nication, to  avert  preventible  disasters,  to  open 
wide  the  doors  of  opportunity  into  all  wholesome 
material  and  spiritual  activities.  But  the  moral 
criticism  of  social  methods  remains  inexorable. 
Morality  is  always  harking  back  to  that  fun- 
damental position  of  the  Prologue,  that  it  is 
the  human  heart  which  is  to  be  satisfied  and 
instructed  and  uplifted,  that  the  moral  goal  is 
individual  good  fortune,  that  a  supposed  social 
welfare  gained  at  the  expense  of  this  good  for- 
tune is  in  reality  social  disaster.  Morahty  permits 
the  state  to  use  force  only  in  carrying  out  its 
police  function.  The  social  function,  to  be  moral, 
must  mean  the  freedom  of  opportunity.  Oppor- 
tunity, to  be  opportunity,  must  be  self-chosen, 
must  engage  the  spirit ;  otherwise  it  is  misnamed. 
Morally  speaking,  the  state  is  always  on  very 
delicate  ground  when  it  comes  to  fulfill  its  most 
important  function,  that  of  opportunity.  And  this 
is  particularly  true  when  it  touches  essentially 
spiritual  interests  in  church  and  school  and  family. 
Many  of  the  state  functions  of  opportunity  are 
325 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

too  general  in  their  benefits  to  have  the  cost  of 
maintenance  individually  apportioned.  One  can 
easily  recall  a  long  list  of  such  functions.  But  as 
a  class,  these  lumping  arrangements  are  morally 
objectionable,  for  they  do  involve  more  or  less 
injustice.  Whenever  it  is  practicable,  the  state 
department  which  is  self-supporting  is  morally 
the  more  desirable  type. 

In  summing  up  this  too  long  chapter,  it  is  un- 
necessary to  avow  its  incompleteness.  The  estab- 
lished institutions  of  society  have  too  deep  roots 
in  our  daily  social  life  to  permit  any  summary 
treatment.  The  most  that  one  can  hope  to  do 
is  to  suggest  a  valid  moral  point  of  view.  Such 
a  point  of  view  is  found,  it  seems  to  us,  in  our 
oft-repeated  position  that  all  institutions,  however 
august,  are  merely  organized  modes  of  conduct, 
and  must  be  morally  measured  by  their  results, 
in  terms  of  strictly  individual  good  fortune.  The 
individual  passes;  the  institution  remains.  Yet 
the  major  concern  of  the  universe  is  manifestly 
for  persons.  It  is  this  permanence  of  the  insti- 
tution which  constitutes  one  of  the  largest  ele- 
ments of  its  usefulness.  Even  family  life,  the 
most  transient  of  all,  transcends  the  life  of  the 
individual  member.  The  school,  and  especially 
the  state  school,  has  a  continuity  of  service  in 
marked  contrast  to  the  transient  work  of  the 

326 


THE   FOUR  INSTITUTIONS 


individual.  The  church  and  state,  through  their 
relative  permanence,  have  been  the  storehouses 
of  ideals,  and  the  useful  machinery  of  service.  It 
would  be  a  dull  person  who  did  not  recognize 
the  immense  value  of  this  institutional  inertia. 
Yet  it  remains  true  that  this  great  service  has 
been  rendered  by  individuals  working  through 
the  institution,  and  that  the  greatest  service  has 
been  rendered  by  individuals  who  transcended 
the  institution.  The  philosophers  of  Greece  have 
had  an  influence  on  mankind  quite  in  excess 
of  the  influence  of  any  university  or  group  of 
universities.  The  greatest  educator  in  America 
was  a  man  who  stood,  himself,  outside  the  school. 
The  moral  teachers  of  mankind  have  been  break- 
ers of  the  old  law.  And  while  one  would  wish 
to  render  all  honor  where  honor  is  due,  it  must 
always  be  remembered  that  this  very  permanence 
of  the  institution  is  responsible  for  most  of  its 
abuses.  The  old  conception  of  the  family,  school, 
church,  and  state  as  ends  in  themselves,  as  insti- 
tutions sacred  in  themselves  apart  from  their 
power  of  human  service,  has  been  and  is  a  fertile 
source  of  all  the  teeming  evil  of  the  world.  To 
sacrifice  the  individual  to  the  institution  is  to  do 
evil  that  good  may  come.  The  one  moral  view 
of  the  institution  is  as  a  means,  a  means  which 
must  always  serve  and  never  obstruct  the  true 
end,  individual  good  fortune. 

327 


XIII 

OCCUPATIONS 

THE  young  people  of  America  receive  a  cer- 
tain amount  of  formal  education.  For 
some,  it  ends  with  the  primary  school ;  for  some, 
with  the  grammar  school  or  high  school ;  for  a 
few,  with  the  college  or  professional  school.  The 
efficiency  of  this  training  depends  upon  the  par- 
ticular institution,  and  still  more  upon  the  daily, 
unofficial  life  which  goes  on  side  by  side  with  the 
institutional  life.  It  is  a  long  story,  the  totality 
of  education  summed  up  in  the  twenty-four  hours. 
But  for  all  these  young  people,  whether  for- 
tunate or  unfortunate  in  their  school  and  home 
opportunities,  there  comes  a  time  when  all  at- 
tempt at  formal  education  ceases,  and  the  child 
or  youth  or  young  man  goes  out  into  the  world 
to  seek  his  own  fortune.  The  average  age  at 
which  these  nestlings  are  made  to  fly  is  very 
young,  —  much  younger  than  a  society  bent  on 
social  welfare  can  at  all  afPord,  —  and  two  ques- 
tions of  large  moral  import  at  once  suggest 
themselves  :  first.  How  can  this  industrial  coming 
out  be  delayed  ?  and  secondly.  How  can  the  in- 
dustrial life  be  made  educative  ? 

328 


OCCUPATIONS 


A  community  in  honest  pursuit  of  welfare  must 
realize  that  it  is  of  far  greater  importance  that 
childhood  should  be  protected  and  educated  than 
it  is  that  industry  should  profit  by  cheap  child- 
labor.  The  utilization  of  children  in  mine  and 
factory,  office  and  department-store,  coal-breaker 
and  passenger  elevator,  as  bootblack,  messenger- 
boy,  newsboy,  farm-hand,  is  prompted  by  our  view 
of  prosperity  as  dependent  upon  things.  The  grow- 
ing protest  against  child-labor  is  regarded  by 
many  honest  persons  as  a  blind  attack  upon  the 
national  prosperity,  due  to  the  ignorance  of  a  set 
of  idealists  unacquainted  with  anything  so  sub- 
stantial as  good  times.  And  the  objection  is  con- 
sistent and  legitimate,  so  long  as  the  standard  of 
prosperity  is  wealth  in  things  rather  than  wealth 
in  persons.  But  once  get  it  firmly  fixed  in  mind 
that  this  old  standard  of  things  is  false,  that  the 
true  wealth  of  the  world  is  human,  that  it  consists 
in  beautiful  men  and  oeautif ul  women  and  beau- 
tiful children,  persons  of  strength  and  accom- 
plishment and  goodness,  and  child-labor  becomes 
a  hideous,  unsocial  thing,  an  attack  upon  the 
very  sources  of  welfare. 

Children  of  ten  and  twelve  are  now  allowed, 
both  by  their  so-called  natural  parents  and  by  the 
state,  to  work  long  hours  under  conditions  ab- 
solutely fatal  to  human  happiness  and  welfare. 
Somewhat  older  children,  taught  by  a  false  phi- 

329 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

losophy  of  life  to  regard  wages  as  the  greatest 
good,  voluntarily  sell  themselves  into  what  is 
vii'tually  an  industrial  slavery.  Young  men  and 
women,  by  premature  marriage,  confirm  this 
slavery,  and  breed  more  immaturity  and  incom- 
petence, another  generation  of  those  who  are  not 
free. 

There  are  several  methods  by  which  this  mis- 
use of  childhood  can  be  done  away  with.  The 
most  ideal  method  is  through  the  force  of  a  con- 
trary idea.  In  the  matter  of  child-labor,  public 
opinion  wavers.  If  the  case  be  that  of  an  imme- 
diate neighbor,  of  a  child  known  to  us,  we  take 
sides  at  once,  and  we  do  the  same  in  a  general, 
theoretical  way.  We  admit,  the  full-blooded  men 
and  women  among  us,  that  childhood  ought  to 
be  spent  for  better  things,  and  we  wish  that  it 
might  be  better  spent.  We  deplore  the  ugly  ne- 
cessity which  seems  to  require  the  substitution  of 
the  processes  of  industrial  money-getting  for  the 
more  wholesome  processes  of  education.  But  we 
falter  when  we  reach  the  practical  side  of  the 
problem,  —  the  ways  and  means  by  which  these 
little  people  are  to  be  fed  and  clothed  and  shel- 
tered, if  they  do  not  work.  The  most  ardent 
child-lovers  among  us  would  hesitate  to  lodge 
their  care  and  maintenance  with  the  state,  and 
so  encourage  the  most  reckless  begetting  of  chil- 
dren on  the  part  of  those  who  mean  neither  to 

330 


OCCUPATIONS 


nourish  nor  educate  them.  What  is  a  very  plain 
duty  —  the  giving  to  childhood  of  its  proper 
heritage  of  happiness  and  opportunity  —  gets 
tangled  up  with  other  duties  equally  plain,  — 
the  furtherance  of  individual,  parental  responsi- 
bility, and  a  prudent  guarding  of  the  social  purse- 
strings. 

Among  cultivated  persons,  public  opinion  is 
already  on  the  side  of  child  freedom.  But  the 
great  breeders  of  children  are  not  cultivated  per- 
sons. They  are  the  very  persons  least  likely  to 
be  restrained  by  public  opinion,  or  even  to  have 
knowledge  of  an  informed  public  opinion.  In 
some  instances,  in  factory  towns,  it  has  been 
shown  beyond  peradventure  that  children,  instead 
of  representing  parental  responsibilities,  repre- 
sent, as  a  matter  of  fact,  possibilities  in  the  way 
of  labor  and  income  too  eagerly  seized  upon  by 
lazy  parents.  And  the  same  situation  holds  on 
many  a  back-country  farm.  We  have  thus  the 
inverted  spectacle  of  parents  supported  by  chil- 
dren, infants  almost,  instead  of  children  sup- 
ported and  properly  brought  up  by  parents.  It 
is  evident  that  mere  public  opinion  is  not  yet 
qualified  to  deal  with  this  question  of  our  indus- 
trial coming  of  age. 

It  is  a  grave  offense  to  imperil  a  child's  life, 
to  rob  him  of  freedom,  to  take  away  his  chance 
of  happiness.    In  many  respects  it  is  worse  than 

331 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

the  crime  of  negro  slavery,  for  it  is  a  crime 
against  helplessness,  and  against  our  own  race  and 
blood.  And  the  effects  are  even  more  appalling, 
—  a  hopeless,  immoral,  degenerate  proletariat,  a 
stunted,  pinched,  pale-faced  race,  who  may  well 
ask  of  us,  their  masters,  if  the  Constitution  be  a 
lie  and  God's  love  a  jest.  These  children  did  not 
ask  to  come.  They  were  not  consulted.  They 
never  promised,  for  the  gift  of  life,  to  give  all 
that  makes  life  worth  having.  They  came  in  an- 
swer to  a  human  appetite,  made  brutally  keener 
by  the  starvation  of  all  the  other  normal  appe- 
tites. And  now  they  are  here,  and  others  are 
coming,  a  great  multitude  of  them.  And  what 
shall  we  do  about  it,  we  people  of  leisure  and 
heart  and  intelligence,  we  people  who  feel  a 
genuine  concern  for  morality?  Shall  we  close 
our  eyes  and  let  the  iniquity  go  on,  this  giving 
of  physical  life  of  doubtful  quality,  and  this 
withholding  of  the  genuine  content  of  life, — 
freedom  and  opportunity  ? 

The  old  patriarchal  idea  of  the  family  makes 
us  hesitate  to  come  between  parent  and  child. 
The  feeling  is  deep-seated  that  the  natural  guar- 
dians of  children  are  their  parents.  Happily,  the 
human  heart  is  so  constituted  that  in  thousands 
of  well-ordered  homes  this  guardianship  is  sa- 
credly carried  out.  The  most  of  us  are  blessed 
in  knowing  what  it  means,  a  mother's  love,  a 

332 


OCCUPATIONS 


father's  love.  We  know  the  sacrifice,  the  devo- 
tion, the  splendid,  unfaltering  faith.  But  there 
are  thousands  of  homes  which  are  not  happy, 
where  this  sacred  guardianship  is  not  fulfilled. 
They  are  the  shabby  homes  where  child-labor 
lays  its  tired  head  to  sleep. 

Yet  there  seems  no  individual  redress  against 
so  great  an  immorality.  What  can  you  say  to 
fathers  and  mothers,  perhaps  a  crippled  father, 
perhaps  a  widowed  mother,  who  from  the  depths 
of  misfortune  and  poverty  yield  up  their  children 
to  the  service  of  the  money-getters,  yield  them 
up  perhaps  with  tears?  What  can  you  say  to 
fathers  and  mothers  shamelessly  giving  birth  to 
child  after  child  whom  they  know  that  they  can 
neither  feed  nor  equip  ?  As  individual  to  indi- 
vidual, you  can  say  little,  and  you  can  say  still 
less  to  industrial  greed,  —  to  the  shareholders, 
directors,  managers,  who  welcome  child-labor  be- 
cause it  is  cheap.  The  shareholders  and  directors 
are  humane  ;  they  love  their  own  children.  They 
know  nothing  officially  about  child-labor,  but 
they  want  their  dividends,  —  life  and  freedom 
and  opportunity  in  one  pan  of  the  balance,  and 
profit  in  the  other. 

And  none  of  us  are  guiltless.  We  all  like 
cheap  goods,  and  we  like  our  hard-coal  fires. 
We  do  not  ask  questions,  and  in  truth  we  dare 
not.   Do  you  know  what  I  see,  when  of  a  dark 

333 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

night  I  look  into  my  own  coal-bin?  I  wish  it 
were  only  the  blackness  of  the  coal  and  of  the 
night.  But  I  see  something  else.  I  see  the  pale, 
pinched,  half-starved  faces  of  little  children  work- 
ing in  mine  and  hoisting-house.  I  see  the  bruised, 
scarred,  pitiful  little  hands  that  have  picked  my 
coal  half  free  from  slate.  I  am  not  calling  upon 
my  imagination.  I  have  seen  these  ghosts  of 
childhood  in  the  coal  regions  of  Pennsylvania.  I 
have  seen  other  caricatures  of  childhood,  the  off- 
spring of  overworked  men  and  women,  in  the 
mills  of  New  England.  Whether  we  find  it  con- 
venient or  not,  child-labor  and  parent-fatigue 
form  one  and  the  same  problem  in  their  baneful 
effects  upon  the  vitality  and  excellence  of  the  race. 

There  is  no  individual  redress ;  modern  indus- 
try is  too  anonymous  for  that.  I  may  personally 
burn  wood  and  affect  homespun  without  lifting 
an  effective  hand  to  save  the  children.  It  is  use- 
less to  appeal  to  the  employer  of  child-labor.  He 
may  himself  be  a  compassionate  man,  but  his 
ready  answer  is  that  what  his  business  rivals  do, 
he  must  do  likewise,  —  a  brutal  philosophy,  but 
quite  unanswerable. 

In  a  number  of  states,  in  the  South  as  well  as 
in  the  North,  an  attempt  has  been  made  to  secure 
adequate  legislation  against  child-labor.  The  dis- 
position is  to  take  whatever  can  be  got,  and  to  be 
grateful  for  the  smallest  protection.  When  one 
.     334 


OCCUPATIONS 


remembers  that  this  slow  process  has  brought 
much  that  is  very  precious  in  modern  civilization, 
one  is  inclined  to  be  patient,  and  to  be  satisfied 
for  the  moment  with  this  opportunism.  But 
when  one  thinks  of  the  children,  when  one  re- 
calls the  health  and  strength  which  they  are  fail- 
ing to  get,  the  beauty  and  accomplishments 
which  they  will  never  know,  the  happiness  and 
freedom  which,  once  taken  out  of  the  life  of 
children,  can  never  be  made  up  to  them,  one  is 
forced  to  believe  that  so  urgent  an  emergency 
needs  more  radical  measures.  Society  must  al- 
ways take  the  long  view  in  all  social  questions, 
and  must  regard  self-preservation  as  the  very 
foundation  of  its  morality.  If  we  were  quite  will- 
ing to  sacrifice  all  the  children  now  prematurely 
employed  in  our  various  industries,  and  could  do 
it  with  a  perfectly  clear  conscience  as  far  as  the 
children  themselves  were  concerned,  we  should 
still  be  guilty  of  a  grave  social  immorality,  for 
we  should  be  sacrificing  that  larger  view  of  good 
fortune  which  we  call  social  welfare.  From  chil- 
dren stunted  and  crippled  by  premature  toil, 
society  cannot  get  vigorous  men  and  women, 
worthy  fathers  and  mothers,  informed  and  excel- 
lent citizens.  We  are  poisoning  the  very  source 
of  social  welfare,  for  we  are  robbing  the  on- 
coming generation  of  all  possibility  of  excellence. 
Life  is  a  question  of  alternatives.  If  one  do 
335 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

this,  one  cannot  do  that.  Educators  well  know 
that  in  the  plasticity  of  childhood  is  wrapped  up 
the  possibility  of  a  more  excellent  race.  But 
children  at  w^ork  for  nine,  ten,  twelve  hours  a 
day  cannot  realize  this  possibility,  or  come  into 
this  glorious  human  heritage.  All  they  can  do  is 
to  grow  prematurely  old,  and  beget  children  less 
strong,  even,  and  less  vital  than  themselves. 
During  adolescence  the  danger  in  this  premature 
labor  is  particularly  great.  There  are  periods  in 
the  lives  of  even  well-to-do  boys  and  girls  when 
parents  and  teachers  must  be  very  patient,  when 
they  dare  not  exact  more  than  the  lightest  school 
tasks,  for  the  life-energy  of  the  children  is  needed 
almost  to  the  last  drop  to  support  the  now  sud- 
den growth  and  development.  Think  of  the  social 
crime  of  diverting  this  life-energy  from  its  proper 
work  of  the  upbuilding  and  perfecting  of  young 
manhood  and  womanhood,  and  doing  it  for  profit! 
The  society  that  does  this,  that  taps  its  life- 
blood,  in  enfeebling  its  children,  is  committing 
moral  suicide.  It  is  producing  anaemic,  half- 
human  men  and  women,  poor  fragments  of  hu- 
manity, quite  devoid  of  anything  so  gracious  as 
himian  wealth.  It  is  producing  the  parents  of 
degenerate  children.  It  is  producing  fertile  soil 
for  the  growth  of  the  defective  and  criminal 
classes.    In  a  word,  it  is  sowing  the  wind. 

Morality  is  very  deeply  concerned  with  the 

336 


OCCUPATIONS 


remedy  for  this  condition  of  affairs.  It  is  clear 
that  the  remedy  does  not  lie  in  separate  state  le- 
gislation. The  evil  is  one  that  demands  national 
treatment.  Not  only  are  the  issues  too  grave  to 
wait  for  this  slow  solution,  the  separate  action 
of  over  forty  commonwealths,  but  from  its  very 
nature,  the  situation  cannot  be  dealt  with  in  one 
state  while  it  is  ignored  in  another.  It  is  a  ques- 
tion of  interstate  industry.  The  modern  organ- 
ization of  industry  has  made  its  staple  products 
cosmopolitan.  The  conditions  of  the  industry 
are  the  conditions  of  the  world  market.  We 
cannot  possibly  go  back  and  treat  these  indus- 
tries as  if  they  were  local.  Neither  can  we  with 
any  hope  of  success  apply  local  remedies  to  the 
evils  of  the  industry.  One  cannot  imagine  for 
a  moment  that  it  would  have  been  possible  in 
1860  for  any  single  Southern  state  to  abolish 
negro  slavery  while  the  neighboring  states  re- 
tained it.  In  the  long  run,  such  a  state  might 
have  achieved  distinction  and  prosperity.  But 
hunger  and  thirst,  cold  and  nakedness,  are  mat- 
ters of  very  short  run.  It  was  not  a  question  of 
sentiment.  It  was  a  question  of  bread  and  but- 
ter. The  prices  of  Southern  products  were  fixed 
by  the  conditions  of  slave  labor.  It  would  have 
been  economically  impossible  for  one  state  to 
abolish  slavery  and  compete  with  other  states 
retaining  it. 

337 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

At  the  present  time,  we  might  reasonably  ask 
Pennsylvania  to  abolish  child-labor  in  and  about 
the  anthracite  coal  mines,  for  anthracite  is  prac- 
tically limited  to  that  one  state.  But  we  cannot 
reasonably  ask  Georgia  to  abolish  child-labor  in 
her  cotton  mills  while  Alabama  and  the  Caro- 
linas  retain  it.  We  need  no  prophet  to  tell  us 
what  would  happen.  The  industry  would  seek 
the  cheaper  labor  market,  and  the  Georgia  legis- 
lators would  be  cursed  for  their  pains. 

The  evil  of  child-labor,  like  the  evil  of  negro 
slavery,  is  one  of  national  complicity.  There  are 
to-day  in  this  free  America  of  ours  between  one- 
quarter  and  one-half  a  million  child-laborers, 
some  of  them  less  than  ten  years  of  age,  some 
of  them  receiving  as  little  wage  as  nine  cents  a 
day.  The  problem  is  large  enough  and  grave 
enough  to  claim  the  attention  of  the  general  gov- 
ernment. The  abuses  can  be  cured  with  thor- 
oughness and  dispatch  only  by  the  same  sort  of 
national  action  as  is  now  being  brought  to  bear 
on  railroads,  trusts,  and  other  enterprises  of  an 
interstate  character. 

The  same  argument  for  the  liberation  of  these 
little  brothers  and  sisters,  whose  helplessness 
and  weakness  ought  to  be  an  irresistible  appeal 
to  everything  in  us  that  is  chivalrous  and  fine, 
holds  true  in  the  case  of  all  the  industrially  unfit, 
the  sick,  the  disabled,  the  old.   We  shall  never 

338 


OCCUPATIONS 


be  a  civilized  or  a  moral  people  until  we  show 
compassion  and  practical  consideration  for  the 
weak  of  all  classes,  and  are  willing  only  to  lay 
upon  those  who  can  bear  them  the  burden  and 
heat  of  the  industrial  day. 

If  a  community  once  come  to  regard  child- 
labor  and  invalid-labor  and  old-ag^e-labor  as  im- 
moral,  the  problem  of  avoiding  them  is  as  good  as 
solved.  And  every  community  given  to  reflec- 
tion must  sooner  or  later  come  so  to  regard  them. 
We  can  no  longer  urge  poverty  as  an  excuse. 
On  a  sinking  boat  all  must  turn  to  and  help 
bale.  On  the  frontier  all  must  work,  each  ac- 
cording to  his  strength.  But  we  are  not  on  a 
sinking  boat ;  ours  is  no  longer  a  frontier  coun- 
try. On  the  contrary,  we  are,  as  our  politicians 
are  so  fond  of  telling  us,  one  of  the  richest 
countries  in  the  world,  and  the  very  most  pros- 
perous. We  can  afford  to  do  what  we  like.  In 
America  there  is  less  occasion  than  anywhere 
else,  and  in  these  early  years  of  the  twentieth 
century  least  occasion  of  all,  for  the  industrial 
exploitation  of  the  unfit. 

This  freedom  from  industrial  demands  does 
not  necessitate  idleness  on  the  part  of  either 
children  or  old  people.  Nor  does  it  mean  the 
absence  of  helpful  human  service,  one  for  an- 
other. That  would  make  good  fortune  quite 
impossible.    There  is  always  plenty  of  wholesome 

339 


THE    CHILDREN   OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

occupation  for  children,  not  only  school  and 
play,  but  also  the  minor  offices  of  home  courtesy 
and  helpfulness.  If  these  occupations  be  well 
directed,  they  are  all  educative.  Nor  need  old  age 
sit  with  folded  hands,  stupidly  waiting  the  coming 
of  the  death  angel.  In  every  active,  well-spent 
life,  unsolved  problems  accumulate,  problems  of 
great  interest  and  importance.  Industrial  leisure 
need  not  mean  inactivity.  The  very  most  val- 
uable things  of  life  have  been  accomplished  in 
these  times  of  industrial  leisure.  In  addition  to 
this,  old  age  is  highly  sensitive  to  the  human 
relations  of  life,  and  eager  to  render  all  possible 
service  within  its  strength. 

The  remedy  for  child-labor  in  America,  as  we 
have  been  trying  to  point  out,  is  to  be  found  in 
national  prohibition,  a  new  emancipation  procla- 
mation giving  freedom  to  the  children  of  the 
North  and  the  South,  the  East  and  the  West. 
The  problem  of  food  and  clothing  and  shelter 
remains,  and  must  be  solved  by  the  state  through 
the  agency  of  the  parent.  To  place  the  problem 
wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  state  would  be  to 
deprive  right-minded  parents  of  a  welcome  and 
helpful  duty,  and  to  encourage  on  the  part  of 
the  irresponsible  the  most  reckless  giving  birth 
to  children.  But  these  considerations  do  not 
justify  the  state  in  leaving  its  children  to  chance. 
The  state  is  morally  bound  to  exercise  a  super- 

340 


OCCUPATIONS 


vision  over  them ;  and  to  see  that  they  have 
freedom,  and  the  food,  clothing,  shelter,  and 
education  that  will  make  such  freedom  individ- 
ually and  socially  fruitful. 

In  the  case  of  children  whose  parents  are 
either  dead  or  incapacitated,  it  is  the  plain  duty 
of  the  state  to  turn  wise  foster-parent,  and  this 
not  alone  for  the  good  of  the  child,  but  quite  as 
much  for  the  ultimate  good  of  society.  Humanly 
it  is  the  desirable  thing,  and  economically  it 
is  the  cheaper  thing.  Each  child  rescued  from 
ignorance  and  vice  means  so  much  less  for  the 
criminal  budget.  It  means,  too,  increased  health 
and  security  and  prosperity  for  the  community 
at  large.  In  point  of  fact,  our  present  method  of 
dealing  with  unguarded  childhood  is  quite  the 
most  expensive  that  could  be  devised.  It  is  build- 
ing an  elaborate  social  structure  out  of  defective 
material. 

The  remedy  for  old-age-labor  is  plainly  some 
scheme  of  state  pension.  Such  a  plan  has  been 
vigorously  opposed  as  an  impossible  drain  upon 
the  public  purse.  But  the  idea  is  gaining  ground, 
and  is  found  to  be  a  practical  programme  and 
not  a  mere  humanitarian  dream.  And  in  truth, 
the  scheme  is  only  a  moral,  effective  way  of  doing 
what  is  now  being  done  grudgingly  and  most  in- 
effectively. The  old-age  pension  is  not  a  charity, 
alms  given  by  the  still  strong  to  the  no  longer 

341 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

strong.  It  is  a  self-respecting  plan  of  support, 
founded  upon  the  acknowledgment  that  the  old 
have  done  their  share  of  work,  and  that  the  young 
are  now  to  take  their  turn.  The  support  of  the 
old  is  inevitable,  and  all  that  the  pension  scheme 
does  is  to  recognize  the  propriety  of  the  burden, 
to  apportion  it  equally,  and  so  to  carry  out  the 
plan  as  to  further  the  happiness  and  welfare  of 
the  aged.  It  was  the  past  generation  that  gave 
us  birth,  that  nourished  us  and  educated  us ; 
above  all,  that  handed  down  to  us  unimpaired  the 
helpful  traditions  of  the  past,  the  fruits  of  civili- 
zation. Without  this  spiritual  gift,  we  should  be 
almost  as  the  savage,  forced  to  begin  life  anew 
and  content  ourselves  with  our  own  small  per- 
sonal gains.  In  a  word,  it  is  to  the  past  genera- 
tion that  we  owe  everything  which  now  gives 
worth  to  our  present  youth  and  strength,  and 
enables  us  to  carry  on  the  vital  part  of  our  own 
work. 

As  soon  as  a  man  ceases  to  work,  he  begins 
necessarily  to  live  upon  the  labor  of  others.  If 
he  be  what  is  called  rich,  this  support  takes  the 
form  of  rent,  interest,  or  profit,  not  sustainers 
of  life  in  themselves,  not  created  by  his  own 
contemporary  labor,  but  mere  social  devices  by 
which  the  industrially  idle  live  at  the  expense  of 
the  industrially  active.  If  a  man  be  poor,  he 
becomes  dependent  upon  the  labor  of  some  hard- 

342 


OCCUPATIONS 


working  son  or  daughter,  the  hateful  pittance  of 
some  more  fortunate  relative.  If  he  be  a  pauper, 
the  almshouse,  the  old-people's  home,  the  parish 
charity  fund,  yield  a  living  so  bitterly  unwelcome 
that  one  may  fittingly  pray  to  be  delivered  from  it. 

The  primal  fact  is,  that  old  people  are  neces- 
sarily dependent.  The  pension  scheme  recognizes 
this  necessity,  but  robs  it  of  all  ungraciousness  in 
recognizing  the  propriety  and  sacredness  of  this 
dependence.  It  holds  that  the  honorable  leisure 
of  old  age  has  as  valid  title  to  the  current  happi- 
ness and  welfare  as  has  the  honorable  industry 
of  the  legitimate  workers.  One  might  urge  the 
exclusion  of  the  aged  from  industrial  labor  not 
only  on  their  own  account,  but  also  on  ours.  We 
younger  men  and  women  of  America  can  hardly 
be  said  to  have  entered  even  the  lower  foothills 
of  morality,  so  long  as  we  allow  the  aged  to  suf- 
fer, allow  old  men  and  old  women  to  work  be- 
yond their  feeble  strength,  allow  them  to  be  in 
actual  need  of  decent  food  and  clothing,  shelter 
and  human  service.  To  do  this  is  to  wrong  them, 
and  it  is  also  to  brutalize  ourselves. 

In  even  so  new  a  country  as  America,  the  prob- 
lem of  the  unemployed  is  a  serious  one.  At  this 
particular  moment,  the  period  is  expansive.  One 
does  not  stumble  upon  the  unemployed  in  street 
parade,  or  encamped  upon  the  water  front  at 
Chicago,  but  one  can  still  see  them  in  smaller 

343 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

companies  in  the  public  squares,  at  employment 
offices,  in  cheap  lodging-houses,  at  police  sta- 
tions, in  hungry-looking  tenements.  The  effect  of 
machinery  has  been  to  displace  the  human  work- 
ers, and  were  this  not  the  case,  machinery  could 
hardly  be  regarded  as  beneficent.  Civilization 
means  the  curtailment  of  industrial  labor,  and  an 
extension  of  the  reasonable  work  and  play  of  an 
industrial  leisure.  Carried  far  enough,  and  civili- 
zation would  give  us  a  true  golden  age,  in  which 
industry  had  become  so  effective  and  so  pleasura- 
ble that  it  would  be  counted  as  part  of  the  fun  of 
life.  But  there  is  a  tremendous  difference  between 
this  achieved  leisure  and  the  enforced  idleness 
of  the  unemployed.  The  true  office  of  machinery 
is  not  to  displace  the  workman  to  his  hurt,  but  to 
his  good.  This  beneficence  can  be  manifested  in 
several  ways  :  by  excluding  from  industrial  oc- 
cupation the  unfit,  children,  w^omen,  old  people, 
invalids ;  by  prolonging  the  freedom  of  child- 
hood and  youth,  the  period  of  growth  and  prepa- 
ration ;  by  shortening  the  industrial  life  and  giv- 
ing a  self-respecting  leisure  in  old  age  ;  finally,  by 
cutting  down  the  length  of  the  industrial  day 
to  eight  hours,  six  hours,  four  hours,  when  we 
may.  It  is  a  fatal  policy  to  have  our  machines 
one  whit  less  effective  than  they  need  be,  or  our 
industrial  day  one  minute  longer  than  need  be. 
The  employment  of  the  unfit  —  the  too  young, 

344 


OCCUPATIONS 


the  too  weak,  the  too  old  —  is  no  more  necessary 
economically  than  it  is  defensible  morally. 

It  is  impossible  to  state  dogmatically  just  what 
should  be  the  limits  of  the  industrial  life ;  that 
is,  just  when  the  young  man  should  begin  his  in- 
dustrial labor,  just  when  the  older  man  should 
cease.  The  most  practical  method  of  approach- 
ing the  question,  and  therefore  the  most  moral 
method,  is  to  consider  the  ideal  conditions  quite 
regardless  of  ways  and  means,  and  then  to  in- 
quire how  ways  and  means  may  be  brought  into 
conformity  with  the  ideal. 

The  social  ideal  is  a  generation  of  young  persons 
possessed  of  the  human  wealth  of  strong  and 
beautiful  bodies,  well-trained  hands  and  eyes  and 
ears  and  voices,  informed  morals,  warm  hearts, 
and  reverent  spirits,  —  in  a  word,  young  persons 
prepared  for  the  most  serious  of  life's  purposes, 
the  work  and  play,  thought  and  emotion,  repeti- 
tion and  original  creation.  If  this  social  prepa- 
ration could  be  gained  in  childhood,  and  a  rich 
after-life  assured,  there  might  be  no  objection  to 
entering  boys  and  girls  in  the  industrial  world 
while  they  were  still  boys  and  girls.  But  we  all 
know  that  such  a  preparation  is  not  even  a  pos- 
sibihty  before  young  manhood  and  womanhood 
are  reached.  The  plastic  years  up  to  the  age  of 
adolescence  are  needed  for  the  upbuilding  of  the 
body,  the  training  of  the  senses,  the  development 

345 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

of  the  moral  and  aesthetic  instincts,  the  necessary 
practice  in  spoken  language  and  observational 
science.  It  would  not  be  too  much  to  devote  the 
first  fourteen  or  even  the  first  sixteen  years  of  life 
to  this  most  important  of  all  preparatory  work. 
The  stiff er  intellectual  work  now  crowded  into 
these  earliier  years,  and  the  consequent  omission 
of  the  proper  organic  work,  has  a  tendency  to 
dwarf  the  final  man  and  woman,  and  to  make 
them  smaller  persons  than  they  need  have  been. 
The  only  argument  for  this  prematureness  is  an 
industrial  one,  -^  the  necessity  or  the  desire  to  be 
out  and  making  a  living.  The  ideal  requirement 
demands  that  these  earlier  years  be  better  spent, 
spent  in  the  upbuilding  of  a  larger  and  more 
effective  personality.  From  sixteen  to  twenty 
may  well  be  given  to  the  more  formal  require- 
ments of  culture,  to  language,  mathematics,  sys- 
tematic science,  and  the  humanities.  Nor  should 
this  higher  course  be  elective.  It  should  be 
broadly  human,  but  prescribed,  intended  to  form 
the  tastes  along  liberal  lines,  rather  than  to  ac- 
centuate premature  preferences  and  prejudices. 
It  is  highly  desirable  that  the  doors  of  life  be 
kept  open,  and  the  thought  flexible.  One  serious 
defect  of  the  new  education  is  its  tendency  to 
encourage  premature  specialization.  This  criti- 
cism particularly  applies  to  those  manual  train- 
ing schools  which  handle  the  mechanic  arts  as 

346 


OCCUPATIONS 


ends  in  themselves  rather  than  as  educational 
means. 

At  the  end  of  this  formal  course,  the  condi- 
tions being  favorable,  our  youth  might  well  have 
a  year  of  travel  and  non-academic  occupation,  a 
special  period  for  making  up  his  mind  upon  the 
important  question  of  what  to  do.  If  the  course 
of  higher  study  followed  a  well-spent  childhood, 
it  might  reasonably  cover  the  greater  part  of  our 
present  early  college  work,  and  the  three  or  four 
years  succeeding  the  Wanderjahr  be  devoted  to 
special  university  training.  This  would  bring  our 
youth  to  the  mature  age  of  twenty-five,  and  this, 
it  seems  to  me,  is  quite  early  enough  for  the 
industrial  life  to  begin.  From  a  large  point  of 
view,  it  is  not  so  much  how  long  a  man  works  as 
what  he  does.  Both  individually  and  socially,  it 
is  infinitely  more  important  to  have  our  young 
people  well  trained  for  playing  a  large  part  in 
life  than  it  is  to  have  them  started  early  on  a 
small  part. 

The  propriety  of  contentment  with  a  poor, 
poverty-stricken  destiny,  some  trivial  scheme  of 
life,  is  preached  on  all  sides,  preached  with  par- 
ticular unction  by  those  of  larger  destiny,  and  by 
those  who  beHeve  themselves  and  the  persons  of 
their  class  better  served  by  men  who  have  not 
made  the  most  of  themselves.  But  morality  has 
no  sympathy  with  such  a  view,  morality  with  its 

347 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

august  insistence  upon  efficiency  of  method  and 
worth  of  ends. 

From  a  moral  point  of  view,  industrial  work 
may  not  displace  purely  educational  work  until, 
through  the  ministry  of  the  latter,  our  young 
people  have  come  into  a  mature  manhood  and 
womanhood,  properly  equipped  to  carry  out  in- 
dustrial work  to  the  greatest  advantage,  and  pro- 
perly prepared  to  make  it  a  means  of  further 
education  and  discipline.  If  this  preparation 
require  twenty-five  or  even  thirty  years,  then 
social  welfare,  that  is,  morality,  demands  imper- 
atively that  the  years  be  given.  At  present,  in 
the  more  strenuous  industrial  callings,  men  and 
women  are  not  only  well  initiated,  but  often  well 
spent  by  the  time  they  are  thirty. 

The  proper  duration  of  industrial  life  will 
depend  upon  the  quality  of  it.  Under  favorable 
conditions,  it  might  continue  for  half  a  century, 
from  the  time  a  man  is  twenty-five  until  he  is 
seventy-five.  But  with  our  present  wealth,  and 
the  high  efficiency  of  our  machinery,  so  long  a 
term  of  service  hardly  seems  necessary.  Twenty- 
five  years,  one  third  of  a  reasonable  lifetime, 
could  be  made  ample.  From  twenty-five  to  fifty, 
—  it  is  enough  time  to  give  to  mere  bread-and- 
butter.  It  is  far  too  much  time  to  give  unless, 
during  the  same  period,  there  has  been  sufficient 
industrial  leisure  to  enable  a  man  to  keep  alive 

348 


OCCUPATIONS 


those  larger,  more  impersonal,  more  cosmic  inter- 
ests which  make  life  as  a  whole  worth  while,  and 
render  old  age  gracious  and  acceptable.  Nor 
would  it  be  wise  to  make  the  industrial  day  of 
uniform  length.  In  youth,  there  is  a  splendid 
superabundance  of  energy.  In  age,  there  is  a 
deficiency.  It  would  be  reasonable  to  apportion 
the  day's  work  accordingly.  It  might  be  well  to 
start  with  an  industrial  day  of  eight  hours,  in 
ten  years  to  reduce  it  to  six,  in  ten  more,  to  four. 
One  cannot  say,  apart  from  experience,  what 
arrangement  would  be  necessary  or  possible  in 
practice,  but  one  can  say  that  increased  efficiency 
in  industrial  methods  and  increased  justice  in 
the  distribution  of  products  must  conspire  to 
shorten  the  present  excessive  amount  of  time 
given  by  the  average  worker  for  the  satisfaction 
of  mere  bodily  wants.  The  cardinal  social  virtue 
being  freedom,  moral  progress  must  mean  in- 
creased freedom  for  the  actual  workers  as  well 
as  complete  freedom  for  the  industrially  unfit. 

In  attempting  to  measure  the  morality  of 
occupations,  the  nature  of  the  work  is  an  even 
more  important  element  than  the  time  of  service. 
Many  of  our  present  occupations  are  morally  im- 
possible. While  opinion  naturally  differs  as  to 
the  precise  content  of  such  a  black  list,  there  are 
certain  underlying  principles  which  do  decide,  in 
a  broad  way,  the  things  that  a  man  may  do  and 

349 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

the  things  that  he  may  not  do.  The  moral  stand- 
ard furnishes  an  all-sufficient  and  easily  applied 
test.  A  man's  occupation  is  not  only  a  part  of 
his  conduct,  but  a  very  large  part  of  it,  since  at 
present  it  takes  the  very  cream  of  both  his  time 
and  energy.  An  occupation,  to  be  moral,  must 
satisfy  the  same  requirements  that  all  other  con- 
duct satisfies,  efficiency  and  worth.  It  must  be 
productive  of  happiness  in  the  worker,  must  ap- 
peal to  him  as  desirable,  must  satisfy  his  individual 
instinct  by  being  an  activity  in  harmony  with  his 
nature  and  powers,  and  quite  as  rigidly  must  it 
satisfy  the  objective  ideal  of  social  welfare. 

Where  the  usual  scramble  is  for  money,  and 
where  there  is  not  enough  money  to  go  all  round, 
the  current  idea  of  desirability  in  all  occupations 
is  their  money-producing  power.  That  such  a 
spending  of  the  days  is  highly  immoral,  however, 
is  plainly  evident  as  soon  as  one  applies  the  moral 
yardstick.  Money-making  schemes,  as  such,  lack 
efficiency  and  worth.  From  the  nature  of  the  case, 
the  money-hunger,  if  universally  appeased,  would 
come  to  nothing.  The  uniform  distribution  of 
money  would  mean  the  complete  loss  of  its  power. 
In  reality,  the  power  of  money  resides  solely  in 
its  power  to  command  other  persons.  It  is  only 
because  my  neighbor  has  none  that  he  becomes 
for  the  time  my  slave  and  servant.  If  we  were 
all  millionaires,  it  would  be  extremely  difficult 

350 


OCCUPATIONS 


to  get  our  dinners  cooked,  our  linen  washed,  our 
houses  swept.  The  essential  power  of  money  lies 
in  its  unequal  distribution.  If  I  pursue  money, 
therefore,  I  pursue  an  end  which,  from  its  very 
nature,  is  not  and  cannot  be  social.  Granting,  for 
the  sake  of  argument,  that  money  does  bring 
individual  happiness,  its  pursuit  would  still  be  im- 
moral because  the  happiness  could  be  gained  only 
through  the  subjection  of  those  without  money, 
and  such  happiness  cannot  pass  the  objective 
moral  test  of  social  welfare.  But  the  supply  of 
money  is  limited.  It  has  a  tendency  to  collect  in 
a  few  hands.  Over  ninety  per  cent  of  our  tradi- 
tional fortune-hunters  suffer  defeat.  The  quest 
of  money  has  therefore  the  further  moral  objec- 
tion which  attaches  to  all  forms  of  gambling. 

These  are  essential  objections  to  money-making 
as  an  occupation.  As  conduct,  it  has  a  very  low 
efficiency,  less  than  ten  per  cent,  and  lacks  the 
worth  of  social  welfare.  In  point  of  fact,  it  even 
lacks  the  worth  of  individual  good  fortune,  for 
we  all  know  that  the  possession  of  money,  beyond 
the  very  limited  amounts  needed  as  a  medium  of 
exchange,  leads  to  as  much  personal  unhappiness 
as  any  other  form  of  intemperance,  is  indeed  a 
fruitful  source  of  all  other  forms. 

We  are  forced  to  believe,  then,  that  all  occu- 
pations in  ivhich  profit  is  the  sole,  or  even  the 
major  end,  are  immoral. 

351 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

This  consideration,  which  seems  to  me  sound 
and  indisputable,  cuts  down  the  list  of  possi- 
ble occupations  by  almost  one  half,  for  it  cuts 
out  all  occupations  that  are  unnecessary.  Every 
one  can  decide,  after  even  a  little  reflection, 
which  occupations  are  necessary  and  which  are 
not,  and  can  cut  out  those  which  have  no  more 
serious  end  than  profit.  Industrial  occupations 
yield  a  marketable  product,  or  offer  a  market- 
able service.  The  William  Morris  test  may  be 
applied  to  both.  Are  these  products  and  ser- 
vices useful  ?  Are  they  beautiful  ?  If  we  know 
them  to  be  the  one,  or  believe  them  to  be  the 
other,  the  occupations  of  which  they  are  the 
fruits  are  socially  and  morally  acceptable.  But 
if  we  know  these  fruits  to  be  neither  useful  nor 
beautiful,  the  occupations  themselves  are  barren 
and  immoral,  a  misspending  of  the  days,  a  waste 
of  that  very  precious  thing,  human  life.  Every 
young  man,  standing  on  the  threshold  of  his 
industrial  life,  can  materially  further  the  cause  of 
morality  if  he  resolutely  decline  all  mere  profit- 
making  adventures,  and  resolutely  demand  of 
his  occupation  that  it  shall  be  worth  while  in  and 
for  itself. 

That  a  given  occupation  regards  itself  as  ne- 
cessary does  not  count  for  anything.  All  occu- 
pations tend  to  regard  themselves  as  necessary. 
It  is  one  of  the  humors    of   life  —  some  look 

352 


OCCUPATIONS 


upon  it  as  a  compensation  —  that  a  trivial, 
wholly  unimportant  task  is  taken  so  seriously  by 
the  little  person  who  does  it  that  he  comes  quite 
honestly  to  believe  that  the  social  wheel  would 
cease  to  revolve  if  the  task  were  once  omitted. 
And  this  remark  appHes  not  only  to  barbers  and 
tailors,  with  their  mock  gravity  as  to  how  the 
hair  and  the  coat  ought  to  be  cut,  but  also  to 
other  persons  not  so  obviously  serio-comic.  Even 
the  prostitute,  as  Tolstoy  points  out  in  the  tragic 
novel  already  quoted,  comes  to  regard  herself 
as  a  necessary  part  of  the  social  tissue.  In  any 
serious  attempt  to  measure  the  morality  of  occu- 
pations, one  may  not  be  content  to  accept  all 
occupations  that  are  vouched  for  by  their  vota- 
ries, whether  it  be  in  the  name  of  industry  or 
commerce,  religion  or  education,  pleasure  or  duty, 
legislation  or  progress.  Occupations  are  not  im- 
personal. They  are  more  or  less  organized  forms 
of  conduct,  and  as  such  are  right  or  wrong,  and 
for  precisely  the  same  unescapable  reasons  that 
make  all  conduct  right  or  wrong. 

But  while  every  person,  not  too  dishonest  or 
muddle-headed,  can  decide  against  the  obviously 
unnecessary  occupations,  the  advertising,  stock- 
broking,  financial  exploiting,  the  speculating, 
patent-medicine  vending,  multiple  shopkeeping, 
and  the  like,  the  difficulty  becomes  genuine  when 
his  scrutiny  reaches  those  occupations  which  have 

353 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

been  capable  in  the  past,  or  are  capable  in  the 
present,  of  rendering  a  social  service  of  high 
utility,  but  which  are  now  commonly  or  occa- 
sionally prostituted  to  baser  ends.  The  lawyer 
who  obstructs  justice  and  works  only  for  a  ver- 
dict in  his  own  favor  ;  the  fashionable  physician 
who  ministers,  not  to  the  needs  of  society,  but  to 
its  whims  and  follies ;  the  surgeon  who  holds 
up  his  victim  for  a  sum  larger  than  the  service 
is  worth ;  the  worldly  clergyman  who  deals  in 
smooth  sayings  and  a  fat  Hving ;  the  school- 
master who  fails  to  educate  ;  the  shopkeeper  who 
distributes  poor  wares;  the  manufacturer  who 
turns  out  useless  novelties  and  rubbish,  are  all 
of  them  socially  unnecessary  and  socially  mis- 
chievous persons.  But  it  still  remains  true  that 
law  and  medicine,  rehgion  and  education,  distri- 
bution and  production,  as  genuine  articles,  are 
socially  and  morally  worth  while. 

It  may  take  courage  to  apply  the  test,  but  it 
remains  forever  true  that  occupations  must  satisfy 
the  same  moral  test  that  human  conduct  must 
satisfy.  A  man  puts  his  b^st  years  and  his  best 
strength  into  his  daily  work.  If  -this  work  fail  to 
be  worth  while,  fail  to  be  educative,  fail  to  make 
him  a  better  man,  he  has  lost  his  best  chance,  and 
his  life  must  truly  be  counted  a  failure.  It  would 
be  a  very  vain  quest  to  try  to  moralize  the  frag- 
mentary residue  of  his  life  without  moralizing  his 

354 


OCCUPATIONS 


daily  work.  No  conduct  is  moral,  however  brilliant 
and  effective  it  may  be,  which  does  not  on  its  emo- 
tional side  heighten  the  sense  of  personal  well- 
being,  and  on  its  intellectual  side  make  for  social 
progress.  MoraHty  in  conduct  is  not  the  specific 
doing  or  the  specific  leaving  undone  of  particular 
hard-and-fast  projects.  It  is  rather  a  tendency 
in  conduct  which  makes  the  doer  happier  and  the 
social  tissue  sounder.  And  the  moral  person  is 
the  one  who  shows  this  tendency  in  all  his  con- 
duct, in  his  occupation  quite  as  much  as  in  his 
home  life. 

We  have  here  a  practical  and  adequate  crite- 
rion of  occupation.  Those  occupations  are  moral 
which  conserve  and  heighten  human  wealth. 
Those  occupations  are  immoral  which  make 
against  human  wealth,  which  lessen,  stifle,  or  dis- 
sipate it.  As  a  universal  end,  the  quest  of  human 
wealth  involves  primarily  the  human  wealth  of 
the  agent  himself.  Those  who  believe  that  the 
world  is  essentially  selfish  in  the  meaner  sense  of 
the  word,  and  that  human  nature,  with  its  prim- 
itive instincts  of  self-preservation  and  race-pre- 
servation, may  be  trusted  to  look  out  always  for 
the  interests  of  the  self,  are  prone  to  recommend 
an  unbridled,  intemperate  altruism.  But  such  a 
course  defeats  its  own  end.  A  community  made 
up  of  individuals  all  bent  on  sublime  self-sacrifice 
would  ultimately  present  a  very  depressing  col- 

355 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

lection  of  broken  reeds.  The  human  wealth  that 
all  were  seeking  for  others  would  have  quite 
evaporated,  and  the  final  result  would  be  extreme 
poverty  rather  than  extreme  wealth. 

There  are  many  who  frankly  admit  this  all-too- 
obvious  criticism,  but  who  yet  hold  that  as  only 
a  small  percentage  of  mankind  will  at  any  time 
embrace  this  extreme  altruism,  their  sacrifice  will 
act  as  a  corrective  for  the  general  selfishness  and 
tend  to  restore  a  wholesome  balance.  But  there 
are  two  fatal  objections  to  such  reasoning.  The 
one  is  that  it  makes  the  end  justify  the  means, 
—  a  maxim  which  at  all  times  and  in  all  places 
is  essentially  immoral,  —  and  the  other  is  that 
these  broken  reeds  are  not  in  a  condition  to  reno- 
vate society.  If  they  possessed  the  very  secret 
of  good  fortune,  their  own  unloveliness  would 
discredit  their  doctrine,  and  turn  healthy-minded 
men  and  women  in  an  opposite  direction.  By 
their  fruits  ye  shall  know  them.  Persons  who 
have  not  won  human  wealth  for  themselves  are 
not  in  a  position  to  teach  others  in  what  human 
wealth  consists,  or  how  to  win  it.  Altruism  in 
its  unadulterated  form  has  no  light  to  shed  upon 
the  right  spending  of  the  days. 

And  egoism  is  as  little  successful.  There  are 
few  thoroughgoing  egoists.  Nearly  all  men  and 
women  are  egoists  in  spots,  but  egoism  is  a  frame 
of  mind  which  it  is  difficult  to  keep  up  consecu- 

356 


OCCUPATIONS 


tively.  Granting  the  illusion  of  an  out-and-out 
egoist,  however,  and  a  very  little  reflection  will 
show  how  utterly  incapacitated  he  is  for  achiev- 
ing any  destiny  that  we  should  like  to  imitate. 
As  a  mere  matter  of  prudence,  the  egoism  would 
soon  have  to  be  bridled.  In  a  community  where 
every  man's  hand  is  against  his  neighbor,  where 
might  makes  right,  even  the  strong  man  can 
gain  only  momentary  supremacy.  Sooner  or  later 
the  giant  would  be  caught  sleeping ;  sooner  or 
later  old  age  would  come,  and  then  it  would  be 
all  up  with  him.  Our  egoist,  to  keep  in  the  fight 
at  all,  would  soon  have  to  temper  his  egoism  with 
a  pretty  large  admixture  of  at  least  expediency 
altruism.  But  suppose  for  the  moment  that  we 
grant  each  community  the  luxury  of  one  thorough- 
going egoist,  while  all  the  rest  are  fairly  altruis- 
tic saints,  it  takes  even  less  reflection  to  see  that 
in  spite  of  the  exceptional  circumstances,  our 
egoist  could  not  achieve  good  fortune.  Human 
wealth  is  not  an  affair  of  the  body  and  senses 
alone.  It  involves  their  health  and  development 
quite  fundamentally,  but  it  involves  much  more 
than  this.  In  even  larger  measure,  human  wealth 
is  an  affair  of  the  intellect  and  the  spirit.  The 
out-and-out  egoist  would  be  devoid  of  sympathy, 
devoid  of  affection,  devoid  of  desires  that  had  to 
do  with  anything  larger  than  his  own  very  lim- 
ited self.    In  the  midst  of  the  prevailing  altruism, 

357 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

such  a  nature  could  not  attract  to  itself  any 
genuine  love  and  care.  It  would  command  pity 
and  the  service  that  follows  upon  pity,  but  that 
would  be  all. 

This  last  case  is  not  wholly  hypothetical.  One 
sees  it  after  a  fashion  in  many  institutions  where 
an  egoist  stands  at  the  top  and  his  assistants  are 
at  least  pseudo-altruists.  The  institution  may  be 
a  factory  or  a  store,  even  a  school  or  a  church. 
The  head  egoist  may  possess  all  the  outer  sem- 
blance of  good  fortune,  —  an  embarrassment  of 
material  riches,  an  apparent  absence  of  personal 
and  lowly  duties,  a  superfluity  of  servile  atten- 
tion,—  but  deep  down  in  his  heart  he  knows, 
and  you  and  I  know,  how  hollow  the  whole  thing 
is.  You  can  see  it  in  his  eye,  however  well- 
groomed  his  person,  and  however  reticent  his 
speech.  In  a  word,  egoism  pure  and  simple  has 
no  commanding  message  in  regard  to  the  proper 
spending  of  the  days. 

These  considerations  are  commonplace  enough, 
and  must  be  quite  obvious  to  all  thoughtful  men 
and  women  who  have  passed  halfway  over  the 
traditional  threescore  years  and  ten  ;  but  when 
carried  to  the  logical  conclusion  and  applied  to 
the  question  of  occupations,  the  result  is  revolu- 
tionary. Half  of  our  current  occupations  have 
been  thrown  out  as  morally  impossible  on  the 
ground  that  they  were  unnecessary,  that  they 

358 


OCCUPATIONS 


failed  to  minister  to  use  and  beauty,  and  were 
therefore  unworthy  of  the  human  spirit.  Of  the 
occupations  that  remain,  the  moral  requirement 
of  human  wealth  makes  necessary  a  selective 
scrutiny.  Granting  that  a  self-respecting  man 
may  not  spend  his  days  in  writing  advertisements 
or  in  other  paltry  occupation,  it  remains  to  ask 
just  what  he  may  do. 

One  may  not  be  too  sure  that  the  occupations 
called  necessary  are  really  necessary,  or  really 
minister  to  use  and  beauty.  It  is  commonly 
thought  that  coal  and  iron  and  copper  are  neces- 
sary ;  that  railways,  bridges,  and  steamships  are 
necessary ;  that  apartment  houses  and  office  build- 
ings and  other  giant  structures  are  necessary. 
But  there  have  been  civilizations  quite  as  inter- 
esting as  ours  which  got  on  without  the  majority 
of  these  things,  and  were  satisfied  with  small 
store  of  the  few  that  they  did  use.  It  is  more 
accurate  to  call  these  later  devices  convenient. 
The  things  that  a  man  must  have,  the  real  neces- 
sities of  life,  are  few  in  number.  They  are  food 
and  clothing  and  shelter.  These  belong  to  the 
primitive  morality  of  self-preservation.  We  have 
already  tried  to  show  that  these  primary  neces- 
sities are  capable  of  a  large  moral  refinement. 
But  beyond  these,  the  word '  necessity '  can  hardly 
be  used.  In  our  modern  complex  world  many 
products  of  nature  and  the  arts  have  high  utility 

359 


THE    CHILDREN   OF    GOOD   FORTUNE 

in  liberating  man  from  the  tyranny  of  things 
and  opening  the  freedom  of  a  larger  opportu- 
nity. Yet  in  spite  of  th^ir  value  and  importance, 
the  processes  which  yield  these  products  are  not 
morally  permissible  if  they  be  carried  out  at  a 
human  cost.  If  coal  cannot  be  mined,  iron  and 
copper  smelted,  railways  and  other  structures 
built,  without  marring  and  brutalizing  the  human 
beings  who  do  all  these  things,  then  the  processes 
of  mining  and  smelting  and  construction  are  im- 
moral processes,  and  must  be  placed  on  the  moral 
Index  Expur gator ius.  It  would  doubtless  be 
found  that  all  these  operations  could  be  so  car- 
ried out  as  to  involve  no  human  loss,  and  to  yield 
only  human  benefit ;  but  until  they  are  reorgan- 
ized along  these  human  lines,  they  may  not  be 
accounted  moral  occupations. 

No  amount  of  convenience  or  reputed  useful- 
ness can  justify  the  sacrifice  of  men  and  women 
and  children.  Prosperity  does  not  reside  in  things, 
but  in  persons.  Both  the  individual  and  society 
demand  human  wealth.  And  so  the  moral  person, 
scrutinizing  the  occupations  which  our  modern 
industrial  life  offers,  must  not  only  decline  those 
which  seem  frivolous  and  unimportant,  but  also 
those  which  impair  health  and  integrity.  No 
matter  what  the  bribe  of  wage  and  cajolery,  the 
surrender  of  human  excellence  is  an  unpardonable 
sacrilege.    And  this  applies  all  along  the  line  of 

360 


OCCUPATIONS 


occupation,  from  the  most  exalted  poet  to  the 
lowliest  hod-carrier. 

It  is  useless  to  say  that  these  things  are  neces- 
sary, that  these  stupendous  achievements  of  our 
so-called  civilization  must  be  carried  on,  whatever 
the  human  cost.  It  is  mere  foohshness  to  call 
these  operations  beneficent,  on  the  plea  that  they 
give  work  to  the  otherwise  destitute.  The  chil- 
dren of  the  established  order  have  always  sung 
such  chants.  They  have  always  declared  per- 
manent the  things  that  are  really  transitory.  One 
must  not  be  too  much  impressed  by  their  state- 
ment. One  must  not  regard  as  permanent  any 
phase  of  civilization  which  is  not  morally  accept- 
able. Every  phase  rests  upon  an  underlying  idea. 
It  is  permanent  only  so  long  as  this  idea  holds. 
It  vanishes  the  instant  the  idea  is  withdrawn.  But 
both  the  work  and  the  idea  belong  to  individuals. 
Each  man  who  declines  immoral  occupation  for 
himself,  to  that  extent  reforms  all  industry,  help- 
ing to  save  society  as  he  saves  himself. 

And  still  the  moral  problem  of  occupations  is 
not  settled.  A  man  may  decline  frivolous  work ; 
he  may  decline  humanly  harmful  work.  This  is 
negative,  a  mere  clearing  of  the  ground.  The 
positive  problem  of  what  he  shall  do  remains. 
These  moral  prohibitions  have  reduced  the  list  of 
conventional  occupations  to  perhaps  one  fourth, 
and  from  this  smaller  list  the  individual  must 

361 


THE   CHILDREN    OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

make  his  own  choice.  Since  the  day's  work  re- 
presents such  a  large  part  of  conduct,  it  is  badly 
chosen  indeed  unless  it  represent  the  worker's 
deepest  preference,  and  bear  a  vital  relation  to 
his  nature  and  powers.  Good  fortune  is  individ- 
ual, and  in  America  at  least,  youth  has  no  pos- 
sible excuse  if  it  fail  to  find  such  occupation  as 
the  heart  genuinely  desires.  But  such  a  choice 
is  not  made  once  and  for  all,  and  the  problem 
ended.  In  reality,  the  choice  of  occupation  is 
made  every  day.  By  simply  continuing  in  the 
old  work  we  virtually  decide  against  all  other 
work.  It  is  a  choice,  and  all  other  alternatives 
have  been  made  as  impossible  as  if  formally  scru- 
tinized and  declined.  Now  morality  is  dynamic, 
a  progress  from  smaller  good  to  larger  good. 
And  conduct,  to  be  moral,  must  show  the  same 
advance.  Treating  occupation  as  conduct,  it  is 
clear  that  occupation,  to  be  moral,  must  serve 
some  higher  end  than  mere  maintenance.  This 
providing  of  food  and  clothing  and  shelter,  vital 
as  it  is,  is  merely  a  secondary  function  of  occupa- 
tion. The  primary  function  of  occupation  is  the 
same  as  the  function  of  evolution  and  education ; 
it  is  the  unfolding  and  perfecting  of  the  human 
spirit,  the  development  of  the  larger  and  more 
complete  self. 

It  is  altogether  possible  to  handle  occupation 
in  this  ideal  way,  and  to  make  it  minister  both 

362 


OCCUPATIONS 


to  the  body  and  to  the  spirit.  It  is  not  the 
easiest  way,  the  line  of  least  resistance.  On  the 
contrary,  there  is  an  appalling  amount  of  inertia 
about  all  of  us.  It  is  fatally  easy  to  go  on  doing 
what  we  happen  to  be  doing.  But  this  means 
the  impoverishment  of  the  whole  adult  life.  In 
education  the  tasks  are  made  increasingly  diffi- 
cult. In  the  spiritual  life  new  and  varied  reac- 
tions are  deliberately  sought.  The  stimuli  are 
altered.  The  days  are  valued  not  for  the  repeti- 
tion of  old  and  twice-told  tales,  but  for  the  new 
knowledge,  the  fresh  inspiration,  the  larger  in- 
sight that  they  may  be  brought  to  bear.  If  this 
were  not  the  case,  we  should  agree  that  the 
student  had  wasted  his  time,  and  should  seri- 
ously doubt  whether  he  were  worthy  of  a  con- 
tinuance of  opportunity.  But  in  life  the  majority 
of  persons  are  guilty  of  just  such  a  wasting  of 
the  days.  They  follow  the  same  grind,  day  after 
day,  month  after  month,  year  after  year,  under 
the  mistaken  impression  that  they  are  moral  and 
industrious  persons,  who  deserve  to  be  patted  on 
the  back  here,  and  credited  with  something  pretty 
considerable  hereafter. 

It  is  gravely  doubtful  whether  these  dull  prac- 
titioners of  routine  accomplish  even  their  own 
special,  monotonous  tasks  as  well  as  the  more 
alert  and  versatile  experimentalist  would  have 
done  them.    As  the  work  grows  automatic,  less 

363 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

and  less  attention  is  required,  until  finally  the 
worker  becomes  a  machine,  a  curiously  useless 
machine  except  for  one  unvarying  piece  of  work. 
But  even  were  it  otherwise,  the  very  reverse  even, 
the  moral  argument  would  still  be  overwhelm- 
ingly in  favor  of  diversified  toil,  for  the  moral  end 
of  the  activity  is  the  character  which  it  has  helped 
to  fashion,  and  only  incidentally  the  marketable 
product.  So  few  persons  see  this.  In  school, 
the  master  directs  the  work,  endeavors  to  develop 
the  personality,  and  so  to  vary  the  occupations 
that  they  shall  afford  the  largest  human  reactions. 
In  industry,  the  masters  have  their  thought  fixed 
on  the  output.  That  is  magnified,  and  the  effect 
on  the  worker  is  ignored.  Nor  can  one  blame 
the  worker,  tired  and  spent  with  the  day's  work, 
if  he  too  get  the  question  inverted,  and  come 
to  measure  success  in  terms  of  things,  his  own 
success  in  terms  of  dollars.  The  easiest  approach 
to  such  success  is  through  wages.  And  so  the 
majority  of  our  countrymen  have  sold  them- 
selves, sold  the  major  part  of  their  day,  the 
major  part  of  their  power,  into  another's  keep- 
ing, and  have  trafficked  away  what  may  not  be 
trafficked  away,  even  the  inalienable  heritage  of 
self-possession.  And  this  voluntary  slavery  is  a 
second  form  of  sacrilege  in  the  name  of  industry. 
It  is  conceivable  that  industry  might  be  so  organ- 
ized that  the  workers  would  be  the  major  con- 

364 


OCCUPATIONS 


cern,  and  that  a  succession  of  occupations  would 
offer  the  peeded  variety  and  discipline.  But  at 
present  it  is  not  so  organized,  and  the  man  who 
permanently  consents  to  wages  consents  in  most 
cases  to  an  immoral  scheme  of  life,  and  has  shut 
the  door  to  the  larger  good. 

To  make  work  educative,  that  is  the  worker's 
main  business ;  to  see  to  it  that  it  furthers  indi- 
vidual good  fortune,  that  it  is  a  source  of  hap- 
piness and  delight,  as  well  as  of  mere  physical 
maintenance.  And  this  can  be  done  only  when 
the  worker  is  his  own  employer,  his  own  master, 
an  independent  spirit  accepting  the  high  oppor- 
tunities that  a  human  life  offers.  If  he  be  less 
than  this,  he  is  not  a  man,  and  his  morality  is 
the  dumb  acquiescence  of  a  slave.  It  is  idle  to 
prate  about  democracy,  if  our  people  have  not 
even  the  fundamental  virtue  of  self-possession. 

Whether  this  question  of  occupations  be 
looked  at  from  a  social  or  from  an  individual 
point  of  view,  the  result  is  the  same.  While 
social  welfare  is  just  the  sum  total  of  individual 
good  fortune,  and  any  failure  in  the  fortune 
means  a  defect  in  welfare,  it  is  also  true  that 
special  forms  of  social  wrong-doing  are  made 
possible  only  by  the  willingness  of  individuals 
to  sell  themselves  into  industrial  slavery.  The 
seemingly  impersonal  evil  done  by  combinations 
and  trusts  is  in  reality  done  by  persons,  and  is 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

practicable  only  because  men  of  brains,  as  well 
as  day-laborers,  sell  their  time  and  strength  and 
honor  for  a  wage. 

What  is  needed  is  a  more  tonic  view  of  life 
generally,  more  courage.  We  can  afford  to  run 
some  little  risk  of  hunger  and  cold  and  naked- 
ness, if  by  so  doing  we  may  save  our  souls  alive. 
But  really  there  is  very  little  danger  of  starving. 
Your  strong,  merry,  reverent  soul  has  a  better 
chance  than  the  craven,  for  after  all,  the  world 
loves  a  man  better  than  a  slave.  It  is  cowardice, 
not  necessity,  that  robs  men  of  independence  and 
self-possession.  Practically  the  wage-taker  says : 
'  It  is  really  too  much  of  a  responsibility,  this 
getting  of  food  and  clothing  and  shelter.  I  am 
not  equal  to  it.  Assure  me  of  these,  —  I  shall 
not  be  over-particular  about  the  quality,  —  and 
you  may  have  the  cream  of  my  time  and  strength  ; 
you  may  have  the  major  part  of  my  manhood, 
and  you  may  make  what  you  can  out  of  it ! ' 
He  is  afraid  to  paddle  his  own  canoe,  and  so 
pulls  an  oar  in  the  galleys.  It  is  a  national  mis- 
fortune that  this  is  the  situation  of  the  great 
majority  of  our  people  to-day.  And  it  is  a  still 
greater  misfortune  that  when  they  do  organize, 
the  object  is  not  a  manly  independence,  but  a 
larger  wage,  an  increased  class  consciousness ! 
They  are  workmen  first,  wage-earners,  slaves  for 
eight  to  twelve  hours  each  working   day,  and 

366 


OCCUPATIONS 


only  incidentally  men.  It  is  true  that  the  masses 
are  ignorant,  but  they  will  remain  ignorant  so 
long  as  they  are  patted  on  the  back  and  made 
to  believe  that  this  state  of  things  is  wholesome, 
this  abdication  of  true  manhood,  this  denial  of 
the  moral  life. 

For  morality  says  that  occupations  must  be 
significant,  not  frivolous ;  must  be  health-giving, 
not  health-taking ;  must  be  self-chosen,  not  im- 
posed ;  must  be  educative,  not  deadening ;  must 
be  sources  of  happiness  and  delight,  not  of  mor- 
tal weariness  and  despair.  If  a  man's  occupation 
fail  to  be  this,  no  matter  what  the  wage  or  so- 
called  profit,  it  is  not  a  moral  occupation,  and 
the  man  himself  is  not  a  moral  person. 


XIV 

IMMEDIACY 

MORALITY  is  commonly  supposed  to  be  the 
enemy  of  impulse,  the  friend  of  reflection. 
Such  a  view  is  a  logical  result  of  the  doctrine  of 
total  depravity,  original  sin,  and  the  shadow-view 
of  life  generally.  Impulse  shows  the  real  man, 
just  as  he  is,  and  the  real  man  being  evil,  all  im- 
pulsive action  must  be  doubtful,  if  not  absolutely 
immoral.  With  reflective  action,  it  is  different, 
they  say.  Moral  conduct,  being  the  opposite  of 
what  we  naturally  want  to  do,  a  conflict  indeed 
with  our  genuine  desires,  can  be  forthcoming 
only  when  reflection  discredits  impulse  and  points 
out  the  better  way. 

It  has  been  our  purpose  to  present  a  concep- 
tion of  morality  far  saner  and  sweeter  than  this 
morality  of  the  chained  beast.  Impulse  is  often 
wrong,  sometimes  sadly  wrong ;  but  the  genuine 
remedy  lies  not  in  flouting  it,  but  in  chastening 
and  purifying  it,  enlisting  impulse  on  the  side  of 
the  right,  and  then  following  it.  This  method  is 
presented  both  as  a  more  rational  method  and 
as  the  only  thoroughgoing  method  of  making 
a  man  essentially  moral.    It  is  the  method  of  so 

368 


IMMEDIACY 


great  a  moral  teacher  as  Jesus,  the  method  o£ 
purifying  the  heart's  desires  and  so  entering  into 
the  kingdom.  He  that  hateth  his  brother  is  the 
murderer;  he  that  lusteth  is  the  fornicator. 

Morality  holds  a  man  accountable  for  the  outer 
act  more  than  the  inner  state,  if  any  discrepancy 
be  possible ;  but  the  man  himself,  to  be  a  moral 
person,  must  concern  himself  most  vitally  and 
primarily  with  the  heart's  desires,  for  out  of  these 
the  act  emerges.  Salvation  is  a  process  of  in- 
forming the  heart,  of  teaching  it  to  turn  to  the 
sources  of  genuine  and  lasting  happiness.  The 
saviours  of  the  race  have  made  this  appeal  and 
rendered  this  service.  Commonly,  they  have 
turned  the  attention  inward,  have  made  good 
fortune  consist  in  human,  spiritual  possessions 
rather  than  in  things.  Yet  so  subjective  a  teacher 
as  Jesus  did  not  hesitate  to  declare  that,  the  king- 
dom once  found,  all  else  would  follow.  But  the 
primal  good  fortune  was  the  inner  state  symbolized 
by  the  kingdom.  To  be  saved,  from  this  point 
of  view,  is  not  to  want  to  do  the  wrong  thing, 
sometimes  the  very  wrong  thing,  and  to  desire  it 
fiercely,  and  yet  by  God's  grace  to  go  haltingly 
and  half-heartedly  and  do  the  right  thing,  but 
rather  by  God's  grace  not  to  want  to  do  the 
wrong  thing,  to  want  indeed  to  do  the  right 
thing,  and  to  want  it  in  fuller  and  fuller  mea- 
sure.    This  seems  to  me  the  only  sincere  and 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

well-bred  sort  of  goodness,  and  all  else  a  miserable 
hypocrisy. 

To  save  myself,  —  and  therefore  to  save  that 
part  of  society  for  which  I  am  directly  responsi- 
ble, —  I  must  do  three  things.  I  must  blot  out  all 
impulses  and  desires  that  are  evil.  It  is  negative 
work,  rather  a  dull  sort  of  weeding  in  the  garden 
of  the  heart,  and  not  calculated  to  arouse  any 
great  enthusiasm,  but  it  is  very  necessary.  And 
it  must  be  a  root-and-branch  tearing  out,  not  any 
mere  pruning  and  half  measures.  It  is  a  sort  of 
gardening  that  never  quite  ends.  Higher  and 
lower  are  relative  terms.  Desires  that  are  good 
at  one  time  may  cease  to  be  good  as  one  advances 
to  higher  levels.  One  must  so  live  as  to  see  this 
and  be  sensitive  to  the  outgrown  chapters  of 
one's  life. 

Then  I  must  cultivate  the  impulses  and  desires 
that  are  good,  make  habits  of  them,  for  the  gar- 
den devoid  of  wheat  is  hardly  better  than  a  gar- 
den full  of  tares.  Morality  cannot  be  built  out  of 
mere  negations,  of  omitted  evil.  It  must  be  built 
out  of  positive  good.  At  bottom,  it  is  this  thought 
that  makes  the  sturdier  mpraHsts  among  us  so 
impatient  of  the  goody-goody  people,  the  people 
who  count  as  good  simply  because  they  have 
not  energy  and  life  enough  to  be  bad.  But 
morality,  as  we  have  seen,  has  no  word  of  appro- 
bation for  this  human  colorlessness.    It  requires 

370 


IMMEDIACY 


efficiency  in  action  and  worth  in  ends,  is  the  pro- 
duct of  the  two,  and  requires  that  each  dimension 
shall  be  sizable. 

Finally,  I  must  work,  not  merely  for  good  for- 
tune, for  happiness,  but  for  high  good  fortune, 
for  great  happiness.  I  want  not  only  to  be  saved 
from  evil  and  to  attain  good,  but  I  want  the 
largest  good,  the  most  welfare.  It  is  a  quest  in 
which  the  goal  recedes  as  we  approach,  in  which 
ambition  knows  no  bounds.  It  is  permissible  so 
near  the  end  of  a  book  on  morality  to  assume 
that  the  earlier  milestones  on  the  moral  path 
have  been  reached  and  passed,  and  that,  for  the 
moment,  we  are  in  the  hill  country.  The  purpose 
of  the  present  chapter  is  this  third  item  in  the 
programme  of  salvation,  —  the  heightening  of 
the  sense  of  good  fortune.  As  good  fortune  is  a 
matter  of  consciousness,  it  depends  for  its  mag- 
nitude upon  the  vividness  and  intensity  of  con- 
sciousness. Whatever  heightens  consciousness 
increases  our  capacity  for  emotion,  for  emotion, 
indeed,  of  both  a  painful  and  a  pleasurable  sort. 
The  vital  people  of  the  world  have  this  intense 
consciousness,  with  all  its  capacity  for  suffering 
and  joy.  This  is  life,  this  intense  participation 
in  all  that  goes  to  make  up  existence.  It  is  a 
greedy  drinking  of  the  cup  of  life,  and  has  about 
it  a  large  element  of  courage.  Great  good  for- 
tune is  not  for  timid  souls,  for  the  apathetic  and 

371 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

lazy,  any  more  than  success  in  business  is  for  the 
slothful.  One  must  be  willing  to  pay  the  price. 
The  greatest  good  fortune  is  an  out-and-out  gift 
of  the  gods,  for  it  is  associated  with  the  full, 
rich  temperament  which  a  man  is  born  with  or 
not  born  with.  Why  one  man  should  have  this 
supreme  gift  and  another  not  have  it,  is  one  of 
the  moral  enigmas  which  apparently  give  no 
promise  of  solution.  To  connect  it  with  other 
incarnations,  with  previous  existences,  is  to  put 
the  problem  at  a  distance,  but  not  to  solve  it. 
The  point  of  interest  for  us  practical  seekers 
after  good  fortune  is  to  know  how  a  meagre  tem- 
perament can  be  made  rich,  and  a  rich  tempera- 
ment be  made  richer,  if  indeed  so  great  a  miracle 
can  be  wrought.  If  we  imagine  a  man  to  have 
compassed  the  minor  moralities,  to  have  no  bad 
habits,  to  have  some  distinctly  good  habits,  to 
be  on  good  terms  with  his  neighbor  and  friends, 
with  himself,  —  and  there  are  men  already  in 
this  hill  country,  —  what  can  he  do  to  better  this 
good  fortune  and  taste  a  still  deeper  and  more 
genuine  happiness  ? 

These  problems  of  higher  morality  are  not 
unimportant,  even  though  the  majority  have  not 
yet  come  in  sight  of  them.  The  same  objection 
might  be  urged  against  all  graduate  study.  The 
problems  of  higher  morality  are  quite  as  impor- 
tant to  morality  in  general  as  are  the  problems  of 

372 


IMMEDIACY 


higher  mathematics  to  mathematics  in  general, 
and  for  precisely  the  same  reason.  They  throw 
a  flood  of  light  upon  all  our  elementary  work, 
giving  us  a  much  more  fruitful  conception  of 
the  fundamentals,  and  still  more,  by  opening  an 
infinite  vista,  they  make  the  lower  work  increas- 
ingly worth  while.  When  one  has  reached  the 
practical  limits  of  one's  natural  capacity  for  good 
fortune,  it  is  highly  pertinent  to  inquire  whether 
the  capacity  may  not  be  enlarged. 

We  believe,  indeed,  that  it  may,  and  that  the 
problem  is  one  of  the  expansion  of  conscious- 
ness. The  thing  that  differentiates  our  vital, 
full-blooded,  fortunate  people  from  the  anaemic 
brother  seems  to  be  the  greater  reality  in  their 
particular  world.  This  reality  shows  itself  in  the 
greater  wealth  of  thought,  the  more  intense  inter- 
est, the  keener  participation,  the  more  emphatic 
impression  that  life  is  eminently  worth  while.  It 
would  seem  that  reality  is  a  thing  to  be  cultivated, 
and  on  the  whole  a  far  more  desirable  thing  than 
much  that  we  do  so  assiduously  cultivate. 

The  sources  of  reality  in  a  man's  life  are 
varied.  They  are  not  necessarily  or  even  for  the 
most  part  material.  The  overwhelming  majority 
of  these  sources  are  mental.  Indeed,  one  might 
properly  say  that  they  are  all  mental,  since  the 
reality  of  our  material  possessions  depends  not 
upon  the  possessions  themselves,  but  wholly  upon 

373 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

our  own  feelings  about  them.  We  have  made 
good  fortune  consist  in  just  these  apparently 
trivial  things.  The  feelings  and  the  validity  of 
the  analysis  may  be  tested  by  any  one  willing 
to  question  his  own  fortunes  and  investigate 
their  fluctuating  character.  Psychologists  have 
pointed  out  that  the  first  effect  of  confession, 
even  the  confession  of  serious  crimes,  is  one 
of  relief,  even  happiness,  for  the  pressure  of 
apprehension,  the  apprehension  of  discovery, 
outweighed  even  the  grave  results  of  discov- 
ery. And  bankrupts,  once  over  the  brink  and 
in  the  hands  of  the  sheriff,  grow  buoyant  and 
light-hearted.  The  thought  is  freed  from  the 
appalling  picture  of  impending  ruin,  and  once 
more  turns  to  more  hopeful  and  constructive 
measures.  So  the  value  we  place  upon  our  pos- 
sessions depends  wholly  upon  our  state  of  mind 
at  the  time.  An  unexpected  windfall  gets  spent 
several  times  over,  when  a  much  larger  fee  com- 
ing in  the  course  of  the  day's  work,  and  possibly 
a  trifle  smaller  than  we  anticipated,  creates  a 
curious  tightening  of  the  purse-strings.  A  word 
of  disparagement  fills  the  artist  with  despair, 
and  robs  his  canvases  of  all  value.  In  such  a 
mood  many  really  noble  works  of  art  have  been 
destroyed,  the  fragments  to  be  afterwards  pre- 
served as  precious  relics.  A  little  appreciation 
turns  a    chest    of  manuscripts   into    a   treasure 

374 


IMMEDIACY 


house,  while  censure  makes  them  so  much  waste 
paper.  The  house  on  which  we  have  spent  so 
much  time  and  thought,  and  more  money,  per- 
haps, than  we  could  quite  afford,  in  the  end  is  at 
the  mercy  of  our  friends.  Their  comment  makes 
it  seem  quite  worth  while,  or  else  a  sad,  humiliat- 
ing blunder. 

In  the  reminiscences  and  autobiographies  of 
successful  men,  it  is  very  noticeable,  the  tremen- 
dous gratitude  they  treasure  up  for  the  men  and 
women  who,  in  the  struggle  days  before  recogni- 
tion came,  encouraged  them  to  believe  in  them- 
selves and  to  go  on  trying."  This  gratitude  is 
deeper,  not  for  money  favors,  but  for  the  rarer 
wealth  of  human  sympathy.  Generations  of  fair 
women  have  had  the  worship  of  enamored  men, 
and  will  have  until  the  end  of  time,  but  it  is  a 
small  tribute  compared  to  that  greater  fund,  the 
offerings  of  a  son  to  his  mother,  the  woman  who 
made  high  achievement  seem  a  possibility,  and 
the  ideal  world  an  attainable  reality.  It  is  these 
mothers,  plain  or  beautiful,  hard-working  or 
luxurious,  who  have  truly  held  destiny  in  their 
hand,  for  in  giving  a  mother's  faith  and  sympa- 
thy they  gave  success.  '  But  Mary  kept  all  these 
things,  and  pondered  them  in  her  heart.' 

It  may  seem  that  I  am  taking  trivial  instances, 
that  good  fortune  is  made  of  sterner  stuff  than 
mere  emotion,  that  it  is  a  tangible  possession,  to 

375 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

be  mentioned  in  one's  last  will  and  testament,  and 
subject  to  the  inheritance  tax.  Those  who  have 
such  experience  of  good  fortune  must,  of  course, 
hold  to  their  belief,  and  there  is  no  discussion. 
But  were  the  whole  experience  known,  it  is  more 
than  probable  that  either  the  good  fortune  is 
not  genuine,  a  mere  symbol  of  welfare  in  place 
of  true  happiness,  or  else  that  it  happens  to  go 
hand  in  hand  with  that  inner  satisfaction  which 
is  the  veritable  good  fortune. 

Where  possessions  heighten  reality,  and  they 
have  this  undoubted  power,  they  become  to  that 
extent  sources  of  good  fortune,  but  never  the 
good  fortune  itself.  To  balance  the  account  with 
precision,  and  determine  just  where  things  cease 
to  be  a  help  and  become  a  hindrance,  is  a  major 
problem  of  the  moral  life,  and  a  singularly  indi- 
vidual problem.  St.  Francis  found  all  possessions 
a  hindrance,  and  espoused  poverty  with  an  ardor 
seldom  imitated.  St.  Paul  declared  in  favor  of 
the  golden  mean,  neither  poverty  nor  riches. 
The  typical  American  prefers  riches.  Even  Mr. 
Lowell  is  reported  to  have  said  that  if  he  had  his 
life  to  live  over  again,  he  would  go  in  for  money, 
since  money  is  power.  We  have  here  three  very 
different  types  of  belief,  and  it  is  not  my  purpose 
to  pass  judgment  upon  any  one  of  them.  It  is 
a  matter  of  temperament.  The  possessions  that 
would  have  bothered  Francis  might  have  been 

376 


IMMEDIACY 


used  to  excellent  advantage  by  Paul.  The  riches 
not  desired  by  Paul  might,  in  Mr.  Lowell's  hands, 
have  heightened  his  own  undeniable  good  for- 
tune. But  for  the  people  who  are  not  Francis  or 
Paul  or  Mr.  Lowell  there  must  be  some  deter- 
minable point  up  to  which  possessions  minister, 
and  beyond  which  they  swamp.  I  once  knew 
a  lady  whose  very  excellent  maxim  in  regard  to 
expenditure  was  to  save  only  what  she  could  not 
spend  to  advantage.  This  bit  of  practical  wisdom 
seems  to  offer  the  touchstone  that  we  need.  Pos- 
sessions minister  just  so  far  as  they  add  to  the 
reality  of  life,  heighten  the  consciousness,  inten- 
sify the  interest,  increase  the  happiness,  and  they 
have  negative  value  when  they  pass  beyond  this 
point,  when  they  begin  to  confuse  and  distract. 
To  the  majority  of  people,  the  poverty  of  St. 
Francis  would  be  a  distinct  disadvantage,  a  dis- 
tinct absence  of  good  fortune,  for  it  would  mean 
the  lack  of  adequate  instruments  to  carry  out 
the  wholesome  activities  of  Hfe,  the  work  and 
play,  the  hospitalities  and  benefactions,  the  art 
and  research.  In  normal  persons  there  is  a  self- 
activity  to  be  satisfied  which  requires  means  as 
well  as  ends.  To  the  majority  of  people,  the  great 
wealth  which  Mr.  Lowell  might  have  turned  into 
power,  but  which  might  conceivably  have  stifled 
The  Vision  of  Sir  Launfal,  would  be  a  distinct 
loss  of  good  fortune,  for  it  would  mean  the  undue 

377 


THE   CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

expenditure  of  time  and  thought  in  its  care,  and 
a  mixture  of  excess  and  caprice  in  its  spending, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  almost  unavoidable  barrier 
that  it  would  set  up  between  one's  self  and  the 
neighbor,  perhaps  the  very  man  or  woman  in 
whose  keeping  there  rested  the  infinitely  greater 
good  fortune  of  love  and  comradeship. 

These  considerations  and  many  more  equally 
or  even  more  telling  make  the  pursuit  of  good 
fortune  seem  strangely  difficult.  Any  general 
solution  is  indeed  impossible.  Each  soul  must 
determine  the  personal  limit,  and  if  the  amount 
of  material  possessions  adjudged  desirable  can- 
not, after  wholesome  efPort,  be  attained,  it  always 
remains  possible  to  readjust  one's  ideas,  and  to 
compel  good  fortune  with  such  available  goods 
as  one  has. 

There  are,  indeed,  two  distinct  methods  of 
growing  rich.  One  is  to  acquire  vast  possessions. 
The  other  is  to  cultivate  a  capacity  for  happi- 
ness. The  one  is  the  method  of  millionaires,  and, 
as  we  have  seen,  is  not  a  universal  method,  since 
vast  possessions  do  not  necessarily  create  happi- 
ness, and  are  not  attainable  by  the  majority. 
Indeed,  if  they  were  attainable,  they  would  lose 
their  power.  Were  we  all  millionaires,  we  should, 
as  I  have  been  pointing  out,  have  considera- 
ble difficulty  in  getting  our  breakfasts  cooked, 
our  palaces  swept,  our  linen  washed,  our  stables 

378 


IMMEDIACY 


cleaned.  The  man  who  elects  to  grow  rich  in 
things  elects  a  form  of  wealth  whose  potency 
depends  upon  the  poverty  of  his  neighbor.  But 
to  increase  one's  capacity  for  happiness  is  open  to 
every  one.  This  capacity  for  happiness  depends 
upon  the  state  of  the  body,  of  the  mind,  of  the 
spirit,  and  its  increase  has  the  tremendous  recom- 
mendation that  it  brings  about,  of  necessity,  a 
heightening  of  good  fortune  for  all  neighboring 
souls.  This  is  the  method  of  the  philosopher,  and 
no  turn  of  the  wheel  can  destroy  the  good  for- 
tune. Even  time  cannot  annihilate  it.  Old  age 
and  death  come  to  all,  but  their  manner  of  coming 
depends  not  upon  them,  but  upon  us.  The  capa- 
city for  enjoyment  diminishes  with  age  in  all 
affairs  of  the  body  and  mind.  Strength  gives 
place  to  weakness.  The  faculties  grow  dim.  The 
appetites  lose  their  zest.  Exercise  becomes  less  pos- 
sible, and  a  source  of  greater  pain  than  pleasure. 
Even  positive  ills  appear,  and  life  may  come  to  be 
a  round  of  daily  suffering.  So,  too,  the  memory 
weakens,  the  immediate  personal  interests  grow- 
slack.  These  evil  fortunes  are  the  portion  of  all 
old  people,  of  rich  and  poor  alike,  but  they  press 
less  heavily  upon  the  man  of  simple,  sturdy  life, 
upon  the  possessor  of  human  wealth ;  and  they 
press  more  heavily  upon  those  whose  joys  have 
been  associated  with  things  and  all  excesses.  But 
old  age  would  be  a  pitiful  thing,  in  truth,  and  life 

379 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

an  essential  tragedy,  if  this  were  the  whole  story. 
Happily,  it  is  not.  The  spirit  does  not  suffer  this 
eclipse.  It  is  the  product  of  experience,  of  days 
and  months  and  years  that  have  slipped  into  the 
past,  that  have  been  themselves  effaced,  but  have 
left  this  permanent  record.  The  capacity  for 
happiness  in  the  spirit  may  increase  with  every 
year  of  life  up  to  the  very  moment  when  the 
soul  passes  into  the  undiscovered  country  and  the 
world-hfe  is  at  an  end.  This  increase  in  spiritual 
happiness  may  be  so  great  that  it  not  only  bal- 
ances the  losses  elsewhere,  but  even  overshadows 
them,  and  makes  old  age  the  happiest  time  of  all. 
We  have  all  seen  these  serene  spirits  who  have 
acquired  the  habit  of  goodness,  of  happiness,  and 
who  expand  in  all  true  living  up  to  the  very 
end.  Happy  the  community  which  produces  such 
spirits,  and  possesses  such  examples  for  a  younger 
generation  !  If  the  tomb  mean  eternal  silence,  all 
is  still  well,  for  the  cup  of  happiness  and  welfare 
was  filled  to  the  brim  and  ever  full.  But  if,  as 
some  of  us  believe,  the  spirit  lives  eternally,  then 
the  happiness  of  the  spirit  possesses  an  added 
dignity,  a  timeless,  indestructible  worth. 

These  considerations  do  not  in  healthy-minded 
persons  produce  any  contempt  for  the  body  or 
the  intelligence,  any  disregard  of  the  present 
moment.  Such  an  attitude  would  defeat  itself. 
The  body,  the  intelligence,  the  present  moment, 

380 


IMMEDIACY 


are  the  sources  of  experience,  the  materials  out 
of  which  the  spirit  builds.  One  must  be  alive 
in  every  pore,  radiant  with  health  and  wisdom, 
possessor  of  the  present  moment. 

The  failure  to  live  is  commonly  due  to  pro- 
crastination. Every  man  expects  to  be  good  some 
time,  expects  to  be  happy  some  time.  This  con- 
stant putting  off  robs  life  of  all  reality.  Where 
all  achievement,  'all  first-hand  experience,  all 
happiness,  are  put  into  the  future,  there  can  be 
no  genuine  heart-throb,  no  vitality,  no  reality, 
for  one  essential  attribute  of  reality  is  immediacy. 
The  philosophers  all  agree  to  this,  but  the  mor- 
alists too  much  ignore  it.  It  is  to-morrow  rather 
than  to-day.  Education  is  tainted  with  the  same 
remoteness,  a  process  which  has  most  of  its  re- 
wards in  the  future.  Life  itself  becomes  curiously 
attenuated  and  unreal  when  goal  and  effort  are 
so  widely  separated. 

In  all  serious  schemes  of  salvation,  the  accept- 
able time  is  now.  Consciousness  is  never  so  keen 
when  contemplating  either  past  or  present  as 
when  engaged  with  the  immediate,  experienced 
present.  To  heighten  consciousness,  to  deepen 
reality,  to  take  good  fortune  at  the  flood,  is  to 
return  to  the  present  moment,  to  make  the  days 
good  in  and  for  themselves  as  well  as  means  to 
future  good.  The  path  to  a  larger  and  more  genu- 
ine good  fortune  is  to  introduce  immediacy  into 

381 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

the  affairs  of  daily  life,  to  make  the  goal  and  the 
effort  both  contemporaneous,  to  have  concern  for 
the  wealth  of  the  present,  living,  eternal  moment, 
the  wealth  of  human  health  and  happiness,  and 
to  have  done  once  for  all  with  that  excessively 
prudential  foresight  which  makes  the  present  a 
desert  in  the  vain  hope  of  making  the  future  a 
paradise.  The  effect  of  this  absent-mindedness, 
this  banishment  of  immediacy,  is  to  create  a 
curiously  artificial  and  unreal  world,  to  make 
us  seriously  doubt  as  to  whether  the  game  is 
worth  the  candle,  and  to  induce  a  very  natural 
and  almost  justifiable  pessimism.  If  everything 
good  really  is  in  the  future,  and  present  virtue  is 
repression,  a  grim  endurance  faintly  illumined  by 
a  remote  anticipation,  then  truly  is  it  a  bad  world 
upon  which  we  are  fallen,  and  wisdom  counsels 
all  detachment  of  desire.  The  one  hope  in  the 
whole  tragedy  is  the  chance  of  ultimate  escape. 

Our  own  attitude  towards  this  prisoner-view  of 
life  is  a  most  important  matter  morally.  It  is  not 
disposed  of  by  saying  that  it  is  temperamental. 
This  is  perfectly  true,  but  morality  does  not  teach 
that  all  temperaments  are  desirable  and  lead  to 
happiness.  On  the  contrary,  morality  says  that 
the  natural  inclinations  are  not  to  be  retained 
in  the  heart  and  thwarted  in  their  fruits,  but  that 
the  natural  inclinations  a^'e  to  be  instructed  and 
disciplined,  essentially  eradicated  and  supplanted 


IMMEDIACY 


if  need  be,  until  their  natural  fruits  are  desirable 
and  happiness-producing. 

It  is  very  noteworthy  that  many  contempo- 
rary writers  of  more  thoughtful  turn,  men  like 
Tolstoy,  Maeterlinck,  and  Paulsen,  men  much 
impressed  with  the  evil  of  life,  with  its  ennui, 
with  its  essential  nothingness,  have  all  hit  upon 
the  life  of  the  simple  laboring  man  as  our  one 
example  of  present  light  and  holiness.  Tolstoy 
has  tried  very  bravely  to  taste  the  simple  life 
which  he  praises.  Others  have  tried  to  follow 
his  example.  Individually,  and  in  communities, 
we  find  some  few  successes  and  many  noble  fail- 
ures. The  ultimate  result  of  all  separatist  move- 
ments is  the  same,  an  inevitable  barrenness. 
But  one  can  understand  the  ground  of  this  praise 
of  the  lowly  life.  It  lies  in  the  immediacy  and 
consequent  reality  of  the  laboring  man's  life. 
Literature  has  idealized  it,  and  speaks  rather  of 
the  dream  than  of  the  daily  toil  and  routine.  But 
nevertheless  it  has  seized  upon  a  vital  fact  in 
pointing  out  that  it  is  a  life  in  the  present  moment, 
a  hfe  of  genuineness,  of  participation,  a  life  of 
wholesome  objective  tasks  begun  and  finished. 

The  lesson  of  such  lives  is  not  to  go  and  do 
likewise,  not  to  imitate  the  poverty  and  primi- 
tiveness,  not  to  ignore  the  fruits  of  progress,  and 
return  to  a  Nature  untouched  by  human  achieve- 
ment and  social  experience,  but  rather  in  that 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

more  complex  world  in  which  it  is  our  privilege 
to  live,  to  keep  ourselves  simple,  our  hands  on 
the  machinery,  our  lives  in  the  present.  Those 
who  fail  to  attain  this  reality  of  the  present  mo- 
ment, who  are  unhappy,  baffled,  discontented,  not 
because  the  world  is  essentially ^vil  and  dull,  but 
solely  because  they  are  always  out  of  their  time- 
setting,  eternally  reminiscent,  eternally  anticipa- 
tory, never  eternally  contemporary,  are  prone  to 
regard  the  happy,  healthy-minded  person  with 
high  disdain,  a  poor,  unperceiving  creature  who 
laughs,  not  because  there  is  anything  to  be  merry 
over,  but  because  he  does  not  know  any  better. 
This  high-mindedness  on  the  part  of  life's  trage- 
dians has  created  the  impression  that  happiness  is 
hardly  respectable.  It  has  given  a  cynical  touch 
to  our  humor.  It  is  robbing  us  of  mirth.  There  is 
a  curious  belief  current  that  those  who  are  happy 
have  not  plumbed  the  depths  of  being,  that  they 
are  under  an  illusion  and  do  not  know  life.  In 
certain  quarters,  to  be  guilty  of  optimism  is  to 
proclaim  one's  self  incapable  of  handling  the 
deeper  problems  of  life,  incapable,  indeed,  of 
even  knowing  that  there  are  such  problems.  So 
obnoxious  does  the  optimist  become  that  just  to 
have  met  him  is  a  traditional  reason  for  pes- 
simism. 

In  spite  of  serious  charges  to  the  contrary,  it 
remains  true  that   the   essential   element  in  all 

384 


IMMEDIACY 


great  world  movements,  in  all  reforms,  revivals, 
rebirths,  consists  in  this  simple  turning  to  the 
immediate  moment,  and  is  to  that  extent  mysti- 
cal. The  new  prophet,  teacher,  singer,  artist,  law- 
giver, is  the  man  who  turns  away  from  tradition 
outgrown  and  meaningless  to  the  wealth  of  the 
present  moment.  The  literature  that  endures  has 
in  it  this  element  of  timeless  truth,  is  always  con- 
temporary, never  obsolete.  The  Hebrew  Bible  is 
full  of  these  solemn  returns  to  the  vital  present. 
In  its  many  books,  grave  and  pessimistic  as  many 
of  them  are,  there  is  nothing  more  impressive 
than  that  simple  name  by  which,  according  to  the 
Mosaic  tradition,  God  preferred  to  be  known,  — 
/  Am,  —  the  God  who  had  done  so  much  in  the 
past,  who  promised  so  much  for  the  future.  The 
Christian  Bible  is  the  similar  record  of  a  return 
to  immediacy.  Hebrew  ceremonial  was  no  longer 
life-giving,  Roman  civilization  no  longer  sound. 
Jesus  came  with  a  simple  message.  He  taught 
the  life  that  is,  the  God  within,  the  present  act. 
All  moral  and  religious  teachers  have  done  the 
same.  They  have  proclaimed  life  real  by  pro- 
claiming it  immediate. 

In  our  own  day,  all  that  is  vital  in  religion 
and  education  and  art  has  drawn  its  inspiration 
from  the  same  fountain.  The  individual  life,  to 
be  moral,  must  be  real,  and  to  be  real  must  be  im- 
mediate.   Efficiency  and  worth  are  dynamic  quali- 

385 


THE    CHILDREN   OF   GOOD   FORTUNE 

ties.  They  have  to  do  with  what  is.  This  instinct 
for  the  immediate  has  great  hold  among  children 
and  young  people.  It  shows  itself  in  their  play, 
and  in  so  much  of  their  study  as  comes  to  any- 
thing. It  is  likewise  the  hall-mark  of  genius. 
Interest  gives  to  life  this  present-moment  vitality, 
and  is  at  the  bottom  of  all  good  and  great  things. 
It  is  an  instinct  that  is  entirely  wholesome^  this 
desire  to  bring  effort  and  goal  together,  this  per- 
sistent feeling  that  all  our  activities  ought  not 
only  to  lead  somewhere,  but  should  be  an  end 
and  gratification  in  themselves.  It  is  a  legitimate 
revolt  against  such  eternal  preparation,  against 
the  constant  putting  into  the  future  of  the  things 
that  make  up  heaven.  It  is  a  legitimate  demand, 
that  for  self-realization. 

This  praise  of  immediacy  does  not  imply  any 
return  to  a  primitive  life  of  impulse,  any  relin- 
quishment of  all  those  precious  fruits  of  reflec- 
tion and  foresightedness  which  the  labor  and 
travail  of  the  centuries  have  so  painfully  pro- 
duced. One  is  under  no  such  necessity.  In  the 
best  of  immediate  action,  impulse  is  tempered  by 
thought.  In  the  moral  life,  the  desires  of  the 
heart  are  chastened  and  informed,  but  they  ex- 
press themselves  with  sincerity  and  directness. 
And  furthermore,  if  the  present  moment  be  wisely 
spent,  the  gods  themselves  will  not  complain, 
for  the  future  is  assured.    Immediacy  as  a  moral 

386 


IMMEDIACY 


quality  necessarily  includes  that  '*  ultimacy '  which 
is  often  opposed  to  it  and  proclaimed  the  greater 
good.  There  is  in  reality  no  conflict.  We  can 
have  no  desirable  ultimacy  which  does  not  grow 
out  of  a  well-spent  present,  and  we  can  have  no 
moral  immediacy  which  does  not  lead  to  an  ad- 
mirable future. 

The  high  good  fortune  and  large  happiness, 
if  enjoyed  at  all,  must  be  immediate.  We  may 
accept  either  things  or  expectations  as  so  many 
promises  of  good.  We  may  linger  over  pleasant 
memories  of  the  past.  But  good  fortune  and 
happiness  are  experiences,  and  as  such  they  be- 
long to  the  present. 


XV 

THE  MORAL  OUTLOOK 

WE  have  here  a  very  human  sort  of  moraHty. 
But  it  has  this  advantage  over  more  aca- 
demic and  remote  systems,  that  it  is  both  sound 
and  usable. 

So  intimate  a  scheme  of  morals  could  hardly 
escape  the  soundness  which  inheres  in  all  genuine 
human  experience.  However  partial  and  imper- 
fect an  empirical  morality  may  appear  to  be  when 
contrasted  with  the  formal  completeness  of  an 
outwardly  imposed  code,  it  has  the  inner  wit- 
ness of  the  spirit,  the  validity  of  an  experienced 
fact.  Such  a  morality  may  be  incomplete,  but 
so  far  as  it  goes,  it  is  convincingly  genuine.  Its 
very  incompleteness  is  a  part  of  its  soundness, 
for  the  story  of  human  life  is  so  far  from  being 
told  that  one  has  a  feeling  of  having  hardly  en- 
tered upon  the  preface.  There  are  intimations  of 
what  human  life  may  be  in  the  future,  but  the 
most  valuable  intimation  of  all  is  just,  that  blind 
intimation  which  suggests  that  human  life  will  be 
something  more  glorious  and  more  beautiful  than 
we  have  yet  had  the  insight  to  conceive.  So  our 
present  morality  is  but  a  prelude  to  that  larger 

388 


THE    MORAL   OUTLOOK 


morality  into  which  the  race  is  slowly  growing. 
In  the  presence  of  this  ideal  and  absolute  moral- 
ity, whose  veiled  figure  occupies  the  future,  none 
can  be  more  conscious  than  we  that  we  have 
here  but  touched  the  hem  of  her  beautiful  gar- 
ment. The  most  that  we  can  hope  for  is,  that 
by  even  so  slight  a  touch  enough  virtue  is  en- 
tered into  us  to  inaugurate  the  one  possible  form 
of  spiritual  redemption,  the  redemption  achieved 
through  self-activity. 

This  human  morality  is  eminently  usable.  It 
is  not  the  morality  of  the  chained  beast,  keeping 
alive  in  the  heart  the  beast  of  unlawful  desire,  and 
depending  for  safety  upon  the  doubtful  strength 
of  a  conventional  morality.  It  is  a  thorough- 
going redemption,  a  redemption  to  be  carried 
out,  not  in  spite  of  the  heart's  desire,  but  through 
the  heart's  desire.  The  thing  to  be  redeemed 
is  human  nature,  and  the  thing  to  redeem  it  is 
just  this  same  human  nature.  An  inner  result 
can  be  gained  only  by  an  inner  process.  Human 
nature  being  what  it  is,  the  heart's  desire  is 
essentially  for  the  things  which  the  heart  be- 
lieves to  be  desirable.  All  men  want  good  for- 
tune. They  have  wanted  it  in  the  past ;  they  do 
want  it  in  the  present ;  they  will  want  it  in  the 
future.  It  is  the  psychological  necessity  of  saints 
and  sinners  alike.  If  they  ceased  to  want  good 
fortune,  they  would  cease  to  be  men,  cease  indeed 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

to  be  conscious,  sentient  beings.  Even  the  animals 
want  good  fortune,  and  through  a  rudimentary 
morality  of  experience,  achieve  it  after  a  fashion. 
But  all  men  who  realize  that  good  fortune  is 
also  the  essential  goal  of  morality  are  by  neces- 
sity more  eager  to  know  and  practice  morality 
than  the  most  austere  moralist  can  be  to  press  its 
precepts  upon  them. 

So  the  process  of  moralizing  and  redeeming 
the  human  heart  is  the  process  of  education,  of 
enlightenment.  It  is  an  inner  process,  a  change 
of  heart,  the  revelation  of  a  world  larger  and 
more  beautiful  than  any  world  the  heart  has  yet 
known.  To  be  genuine,  it  must  be  voluntary,  a 
purification  of  the  heart's  desires  through  know- 
ledge, and  not  the  compressing  of  desire  into 
external  and  alien  moulds.  Men  cannot  be  saved 
en  masse  by  state  or  church  or  school,  by  any 
outer  compulsion.  They  may  not  be  thrust  into 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  as  cattle  into  fat  pastures. 
If  that  were  a  good  way,  the  great  God  would 
have  done  it  long  ago.  But  one  by  one,  men 
enter  the  kingdom  of  the  perfect  life  through 
the  compulsion  of  their  own  desires.  It  is  not  a 
place,  but  a  condition.  It  is  never  distant,  never 
closed,  never  over-crowded.  In  its  serene  commo- 
diousness  there  is  always  welcome. 

This  genuine  morality  is  not  the  command 
of  any  institution  or  oracle.    It  is  something  for 

390 


THE    MORAL    OUTLOOK 


a  man  to  discover  through  the  process  of  daily 
life,  and  to  discover  continuously  throughout  the 
whole  of  life.  It  is  wrapped  up  in  the  very 
nature  of  things,  and  quite  as  unescapable  as  the 
force  of  gravitation.  It  is  a  part  of  the  great 
sanity  of  the  universe,  the  principle  of  causa- 
tion operating  in  the  spirit.  And  the  universe  is 
the  most  excellent  of  schoolmasters.  It  offers 
us  freedom  and  opportunity,  —  freedom  to  know 
things  as  they  are,  in  an  increasing  measure  of 
perception,  and  opportunity  to  harmonize  the 
daily  life  with  the  perceived  reality  of  things. 

To  see,  to  feel,  to  think,  —  that  is,  to  live,  to 
hve  eagerly,  even  greedily,  —  this  is  the  condition 
of  enlightenment. 

The  dead  soul  may  not  participate  in  this  vital 
morality.  It  is  to  such  a  soul  a  sealed  book,  an 
unknown  tongue.  And  this  is  the  grave  moral 
objection  to  all  that  is  deadening  in  our  modern 
social  life,  to  family  aridness,  to  school  routine, 
to  church  creed,  to  industrial  grind,  to  state  exac- 
tion, for  it  kills  the  life  of  the  spirit,  and  makes 
impossible  that  superb  morality  which  springs 
from  throbbing  human  life  and  from  enlighten- 
ment. To  those  who  go  on  the  quest  of  good  for- 
tune, it  is  a  supreme  duty  to  be  alert,  to  wonder, 
to  be  curious,  to  see  things  as  they  are,  to  be  ahve 
with  all  the  intensity  and  earnestness  of  a  moral 
passion.    It  is  an  old  cry,  this  cry  for  more  light, 

391 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

but  it  has  been  regarded  by  the  Western  world, 
not  as  a  cry  of  the  whole  human  spirit,  but  as 
having  to  do  solely  with  the  intellectual  life. 
Even  in  America,  light  is  too  much  conceived  as 
a  luxury,  something  to  be  indulged  in  by  those 
who  care  to  give  up  the  more  solid  business  of 
the  hour,  not  as  something  which  constitutes  the 
one  fundamental  duty  of  mankind.  We  hear  the 
dispraise  of  culture,  of  the  higher  education. 
They  are  said  quite  solemnly  to  interfere  with 
business  success,  and  therefore  to  be  undesirable. 
As  a  result,  the  majority  of  our  men  are  essen- 
tially uncultivated,  and  this  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  their  native  ability  has  easily  made  them  fac- 
tors to  be  reckoned  with  in  the  world  of  affairs. 
And  our  women,  in  spite  of  their  graciousness, 
possess  for  the  most  part  only  a  pseudo-culture. 
All  disparagement  of  the  morality  of  insight 
really  springs  from  a  profound  and  paralyzing 
skepticism.  Men  do  not  believe  that  at  heart 
the  universe  is  good,  that  the  moral  law  is  fun- 
damentally a  natural  law,  that  morality  consists 
in  seeing  things  as  they  are,  in  enlightenment. 
Neither  does  the  state  believe  it,  nor  the  church. 
Even  the  school,  in  spite  of  Socrates  and  Emer- 
son, believes  it  only  in  part.  Men  believe  practi- 
cally that  the  world  is  at  heart  evil,  that  morality 
has  to  do  with  things  as  they  ought  to  be,  rather 
than  with  things  as  they  eternally  are. 

392 


THE    MORAL    OUTLOOK 


This  belief  that  morality  is  concerned  with  a 
hypothetical  world  alien  to  actual  life  has  made 
our  popular  morality  highly  speculative  and  arti- 
ficial. It  is  conventional  morality,  rather  than 
necessary  morality.  But  in  point  of  fact,  conven- 
tional morality  is  an  indeterminate  expression. 
It  may  be  a  general  morality,  or  an  out-and-out 
immorality,  —  a  wise  summing-up  of  human  ex- 
perience, or  an  unchastened  out-reach  into  spec- 
ulation. Conventional  morality  is  a  large  compo- 
nent of  what  we  call  conscience.  It  makes  the 
uninstructed  conscience  an  unsafe  guide  to  genu- 
ine good  conduct.  The  man  who  follows  his  con- 
science is  often  an  immoral  man,  for  he  follows  a 
body  of  prejudice  and  convention,  not  commonly 
in  harmony  with  that  natural  sanity  which  is  the 
very  heart  of  the  moral  law. 

In  truth,  the  one  method  of  morality  is  edu- 
cation, the  passionate  process  of  righteousness. 
And  by  education  is  meant  not  alone  the  process 
of  childhood  and  youth,  the  teaching  by  which 
we  try  to  bring  to  others  the  large  realities  of 
life,  but  still  more  that  conscious,  self-imposed 
process,  as  unending  as  existence  itself,  by  which 
a  man  in  earnest  tries  to  see  and  to  know.  The 
moral  life  is  a  divine  discipline,  an  escape  from 
ignorance,  a  coming  into  knowledge.  For  moral- 
ity grows  out  of  the  insight  born  of  experience, 
is  the  child  of  wisdom.    From  this  point  of  view, 

393 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

self -education  is  a  moral  duty  of  fundamental 
order ;  and  no  mode  of  life  is  permissible  which 
does  not  come  to  us  richly  freighted  with  wisdom- 
giving  experience. 

To  see,  —  that  is  the  supreme  duty,  —  to  see 
things  as  they  are,  and  yet  to  see.  To  see  in 
any  full  measure  is,  of  necessity,  to  do.  But  to 
put  this  moral  insight  into  practice  is  to  pass 
from  theoretical  morality  to  its  gracious  applica- 
tion, religion.  For  religion  is  essentially  a  man's 
attitude  towards  life,  towards  the  universe.  No 
man  is  without  a  religion.  Salvation  is  not  a  pro- 
cess of  getting  religion,  as  the  popular  phrase 
has  it.  It  is  a  process  of  changing  one's  religion, 
building  up  a  larger  and  more  wholesome  atti- 
tude towards  life  in  place  of  a  smaller  and  meaner 
one.  So  religion,  morality  in  movement,  must  be 
progressive,  sweeping  the  spirit  onward,  out  of 
the  smaller  into  the  larger  life,  out  of  the  dark- 
ness into  the  light.  And  just  as  morality  has 
in  education  its  approved  method,  so  religion 
has  in  habit  its  approved  method,  in  habit,  that 
automatic  goodness  on  which  so  much  stress  has 
already  been  laid,  which  renders  the  incompara- 
ble service  of  wrapping  up  in  the  very  organ- 
ism itself  the  fruits  of  every  moral  insight,  and 
leaving  the  spirit  free  for  fresh  conquests  and 
new  births. 

Through  self -education,  we  recognize  morality ; 

394 


THE    MORAL    OUTLOOK 


through  rendering  its  insights  habitual  in  con- 
duet,  we  put  on  rehgion. 

Such  a  conception  of  religion  makes  it  some- 
thing greater  than  the  historic  activity  of  any 
church,  however  august,  and  plainly  differentiates 
it  from  theology,  the  body  of  church  doctrine. 
To  many  devout  persons  there  is  a  fundamental 
distinction  between  religion  and  morality,  reli- 
gion being  the  far  higher  reality,  and  morality  its 
very  humble  handmaiden.  This  separateness  even 
disparages  morality,  —  mere  morality,  it  is  called, 
—  and  too  often  goes  to  the  extreme  of  divorcing 
morality  from  religion.  So  it  becomes  possible 
to  be  religious  without  being  moral.  The  secular 
and  church  history  of  the  Middle  Ages  abounds 
in  illustrations  of  this  essential  contradiction, 
faithful  sons  of  the  church  living  lives  of  open 
scandal.  One  sees  the  same  evil  at  the  present 
moment,  and  sees  it  in  the  newer,  reformed  com- 
munions as  well  as  in  the  more  historic  churches. 
The  unavoidable  effect  of  emphasizing  doctrine 
as  a  means  of  salvation  is  to  produce  a  lament- 
able carelessness  of  life.  Those  sects  which  lay 
the  greatest  stress  upon  free  grace  and  other 
forms  of  metaphysical  redemption  present,  as  a 
rule,  the  poorest  showing  in  the  way  of  genuine 
morality.  Doctrinal  apologists  have  of  course 
explained  the  situation  by  saying  that  all  the 
while  rehgion  herself  is  unde filed,  and  that  the 

395 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

immorality  must  be  charged  to  the  weakness  of 
human  nature.  It  seems  that  the  man  asleep  is 
religiouSj  and  awake,  immoral. 

The  historical  objection  to  such  an  explanation 
lies  in  the  fact  that  many  of  the  most  atrocious 
immoralities,  such  as  the  cruelties  of  the  Inqui- 
sition on  the  Continent,  and  the  persecution  of 
the  sectarians  in  Great  Britain,  were  committed 
in  the  name  of  religion.  Perhaps  the  more  se- 
rious objection  is  psychological.  Men  may  be 
good  and  bad  in  spots,  local  aberrations  due  to 
the  universal  human  inconsistency,  but  on  the 
whole,  human  consciousness  is  a  unit.  The  char- 
acter which  a  man  creates  for  himself,  and  which 
becomes  the  significant  part  of  him,  is  all  of  a 
piece.  Jesus  taught  that  to  break  the  law  in  one 
particular  is  to  break  it  in  all  particulars.  Mo- 
rality, as  we  have  seen,  does  not  depend  upon 
the  exercise  of  any  chosen  set  of  virtues,  cardi- 
nal or  minor,  but  upon  the  general  attitude  of 
the  man,  upon  the  tendency  in  daily  conduct, 
which  stamps  him  as  good  or  bad.  Religion,  if 
it  is  to  be  a  vital  reality,  must  possess  a  similar 
all-inclusiveness,  must  be  a  man's  spiritual  state, 
taken  as  a  whole,  and  the  gracious  acts  which 
flow  out  of  that  state.  Pure  religion  and  unde- 
filed  was  long  ago  defined  in  just  such  terms  as 
these,  and  the  definition  has  been  stated  anew  by 
all  the  great  religious  teachers  of  mankind. 

396 


THE    MORAL    OUTLOOK 


In  point  of  fact,  religion  and  morality  are.  es- 
sentially one  and  the  same  thing,  a  general  atti- 
tude towards  life  which  makes  for  the  hisrhest 
good  fortune  of  the  individual  and  the  deepest 
welfare  of  the  community.  It  is  a  barren  attempt, 
this  attempt  to  distinguish  between  religion  and 
morality.  If  we  are  to  draw  any  line  whatever, 
we  may  more  profitably  consider  morality  to  be 
the  science  of  right  conduct,  our  body  of  empiri- 
cal spiritual  truth,  and  make  religion  the  more 
personal  term  of  duty,  of  effort,  of  the  will  bent 
on  putting  morality  into  action. 

The  only  dissatisfaction  which  the  spirit  suffers 
from  this  identification  of  religion  with  morality 
comes,  I  think,  from  the  feeling  that  the  whole 
story  of  the  inner  life  has  not  thus  been  told; 
that  while  any  true  religion  must  include  the 
whole  of  morality,  religion  herself  is  larger  than 
any  interest  of  the  earth-life,  is  indeed  a  tran- 
scendent out-reach  into  the  unseen.  This  would 
be  a  true  criticism,  if  morality  were  a  mere  con- 
ventional matter,  and  were  limited  to  its  strict 
etymological  meaning.  The  spirit  would  be  quite 
right  in  demanding  something  more  juicy  and 
life-giving  than  these  doubtful  social  conventions. 
But  that  larger  morality  which  we  have  here 
been  trying  to  present  has  to  do  with  human 
conduct  in  all  its  aspects,  with  inner  states  as 
well  as  with  outer  acts,  and  human  conduct  in- 

397 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

eludes  virtually  the  whole  of  life.  So  any  belief 
in  the  eternities,  in  God,  in  immortality,  in  the 
unseen  world,  in  a  higher  order  of  beings,  in 
man's  relation  to  the  universe,  is  a  part  of  human 
conduct,  and  as  such  is  a  part  of  the  subject- 
matter  of  morals.  If  this  belief  be  vital,  a  reality 
of  the  heart  rather  than  of  the  lips,  it  must  per- 
ceptibly touch  one's  whole  attitude,  and  so  mani- 
fest itself  in  conduct  of  a  larger  and  more  cosmic 
order.  The  thing  which  religion  and  morality 
alike  are  to  redeem  is  life  as  a  whole.  A  belief 
which  is  not  incorporated  into  life,  into  conduct, 
is  either  insincere,  or  else  it  lacks  significance, 
a  mere  cobweb,  a  will-o'-the-wisp,  a  speculation 
without  dignity  or  worth.  Of  very  small  value  is 
my  belief  in  God,  unless  I  draw  upon  his  power ; 
in  immortality,  unless  I  manifest  serenity  and 
leisure  ;  in  the  unseen  world,  unless  I  am  sobered 
by  its  mystery ;  in  gods  and  angels,  unless  they 
are  to  me  inspiration  and  example ;  in  the  high 
destiny  of  mankind,  unless  I  try  honestly  and 
sturdily  to  achieve  it. 

Beliefs  have  to  do  with  the  unseen,  with  the 
genuine  mystery  of  life,  and  cannot  be  forced. 
I  beheve  what  I  must,  not  what  J  would.  Yet, 
as  elements  in  human  conduct,  all  beliefs  are 
open  to  moral  judgment.  One  is  quite  as  bound 
to  purify  one's  beliefs  as  to  purify  one's  outer 
acts.  Any  faith  which  lowers  human  excellence 

398 


THE   MORAL   OUTLOOK 


is  on  the  face  of  it  discredited.  Any  belief 
which  produces  essentially  good  fruit  has  at  least 
a  strong  presumption  in  its  favor.  One  may 
adopt,  in  a  tentative  way,  any  set  of  beliefs  which 
seem  to  complete  and  rationaUze  the  partial  ex- 
perience of  the  present.  Such  beliefs  are  impli- 
cations from  actual  experience,  and  while  they 
may  perhaps  claim  no  greater  authority  than  a 
high  degree  of  probabihty,  they  may  reasonably 
be  accepted  in  the  same  spirit  that  one  accepts 
a  fruitful  hypothesis  in  science.  It  is  eminently 
worth  while  for  a  man  who  is  without  any  active 
beliefs  as  sources  of  conduct  to  ask  himself 
whether  their  omission  is  not  a  form  of  laziness, 
a  mere  drifting,  a  lack  of  imagination  and  of 
enterprise ;  and  whether  this  omission  is  not 
condemning  him  to  a  less  successful  daily  life 
than  he  might  have  known  had  he  taken  the 
trouble  to  scrutinize  human  experience  and  in- 
quire into  some  of  its  mtore  helpful  implications. 
No  wholesome  structure  can  be  built  out  of 
negations. 

For  reHgion  is  not  fixed.  There  are  not  ten 
great  religions.  There  are  as  many  religions  as 
there  are  human  hearts  beating ;  and  of  these 
religions,  all  are  great  that  manifest  sincerity 
and  progress.  Religion  is  as  varied  as  that  quest 
of  good  fortune  out  of  which  all  morality  and 
religion  have  grown.    It  is  an  individual  thing, 

399 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

and  being  identical  with  life,  it  sums  up  at  any 
moment  the  achievement  of  the  striving  human 
heart.  The  East  understands  this  matter  better 
than  does  the  West.  In  the  East  they  do  not  try 
to  import  religion  into  life.  The  phrase  would 
be  meaningless.  To  them,  —  to  the  best  of  them, 
—  religion  and  life  are  one  and  the  same  thing. 
The  identification  is  complete.  This  is  the  secret 
of  the  power  which  Eastern  religions  have  over 
all  eager  and  hungry  souls.  It  is  the  secret  of 
the  power  of  those  Christian  sects  which  turn 
upon  works  rather  than  upon  free  grace.  It  is 
the  secret  of  the  growing  power  of  those  mod- 
ern cults  of  optimism  which,  in  spite  of  their 
several  vagaries,  have  undoubtedly  set  morality  in 
motion,  and  made  religion  and  life  identical.  It 
is  the  secret  of  the  beauty  in  the  lives  of  those 
eminent  men  of  science  who  have  put  their  cau- 
sational  beliefs  into  practice.  It  is  the  very  heart 
of  that  experimental  lif^  which  declines  to  count 
material  enterprises  as  other  than  passing  means, 
and  stands  out  resolutely  for  that  larger  end,  the 
welfare  of  the  spirit. 

The  present  moral  outlook  is  full  of  promise. 
It  is  assuredly  a  victorious  moral  world  in  which 
the  wrong  ideals  of  good  fortune,  the  wrong 
methods  of  daily  life,  proclaim  themselves  by 
their  very  failure.  It  is  also  a  happily  constituted 
moral  world  in  which  the  good  fortune  sought 

400 


THE    MORAL    OUTLOOK 


and  gained  is  not  uniform  and  deadly  dull,  but 
marvelously  varied,  full  of  surprise  and  beauty. 
And  it  is  a  blessed  moral  world  surely,  in  which 
I  am  neither  obliged  to  submit  my  own  ideal  of 
good  fortune  to  the  vote  of  my  less  informed 
neighbors,  nor,  less  informed  thail  they,  to  pre- 
scribe their  ideals.  The  conditions  could  hardly 
be  more  favorable  for  the  development  of  human 
character.  Our  present  world  is  not  only  good, 
but,  morally  speaking,  it  seems  to  me  the  best 
possible  type  of  world,  for  it  is  essentially  a  sane 
world.  The  great  principle  of  cause  and  effect 
operates  in  the  affairs  of  the  spirit,  as  well  as  in 
those  of  the  body. 

I  create  my  own  earth  and  my  own  heaven ; 
through  enlightenment,  I  adorn  them;  through 
habit,  I  take  possession  of  them.  I  awake  each 
morning  to  a  heightened  wealth,  to  the  possibiU- 
ties  of  a  larger  day.  I  go  to  bed  each  night 
undiscouraged  and  content.  What  if  my  gains 
are  infinitesimal,  if  I  still  seem  to  my  neighbor 
a  very  poor  man  ?  One  need  not  on  that  account 
whimper  and  cry  out.  The  soul  believes  in  itself ; 
it  has  infinite  time. 

The  vision  of  a  larger  life  is  open  to  every 
man.  It  is  truly  catholic,  is  universal,  since  in 
some  measure  it  touches  every  human  heart. 
From  such  examples  of  the  larger  life  as  I  have 
found  in  life  and  in  literature,  from  such  small 

401 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

experiments  as  I  have  been  able  myself  to  make, 
I  am  convinced  of  the  reality  of  such  a  life,  of  its 
compelling  beauty,  of  its  essential  religion.  This 
conception  of  religion  can  be  compressed  into  no 
specific  creed.  It  may  be  stated  only  in  the  broad- 
est and  most  general  terms.  For  this  path  from 
nothingness  to  God,  from  ignorance  to  enlight- 
enment, is  not  a  broad  highway  on  which  men 
travel  in  noisy  companies.  It  is  rather  an  infi- 
nite spiral,  up  which  a  man  climbs  in  the  awful 
solitude  of  his  own  spirit. 

The  most  that  can  be  said  of  any  man's  reli- 
gion, by  way  of  classification,  is  that  it  belongs 
to  a  certain  type.  In  its  full  statement  it  is  indi- 
vidual. How  essentially  immoral  is  the  attempt 
of  person  or  institution  to  check  this  free  play  of 
the  spirit  and  chain  it  to  one  of  the  milestones 
on  the  road !  Each  man  has  his  own  religion,  his 
own  attitude,  his  own  ideals,  created  by  his  own 
nature,  and  responding  to  what  he  believes  to 
be  its  needs.  It  is  not  for  another  to  judge  or  to 
despise.  For  out  of  this  soil,  however  humble, 
the  better  self  must  grow.  More  sacred  than 
any  property  right,  yet  less  cared  for  by  law  and 
public  opinion,  is  this  precious  possession,  person- 
ality. I  must  respect  it  in  others ;  I  must  guard 
it  in  myself. 

What  I  am,  —  that  is  my  religion.  What  I 
may  be,  —  that  is  my  possible  destiny.     What 

402 


THE    MORAL    OUTLOOK 


I  ought  to  be,  —  that  is  my  highest  good  fortune. 
But  these  are  not  separate  and  unrelated  facts. 
On  the  contrary,  what  I  am  determines  what  I 
may  be,  and  what  I  may  be  determines  what  I 
ought  to  be.  The  way  of  life  is  not  a  series  of 
leaps  over  separating,  bottomless  chasms  from 
one  spiritual  island  to  another.  The  way  of  life 
is  rather  a  gentle  passing  from  conduct  of  low 
efficiency  and  limited  worth  to  conduct  of  high 
efficiency  and  cosmic  worth.  Like  all  the  pro- 
cesses of  evolution,  it  is  continuous,  the  daily 
unfolding  and  perfecting  of  the  human  spirit 
through  harmonizing  one's  habits  with  one's 
insight. 

In  the  practical  affairs  of  life,  this  willingness 
to  look  straight,  to  identify  religion  with  life, 
would  remove,  I  venture  to  think,  at  least  the 
major  part  of  all  the  many  difficulties  that  beset 
mankind.  The  moral  life  consists  in  this  vital 
awakening,  —  seeing  things  as  they  are,  once, 
twice,  always ;  seeing  more  and  more  things, 
seeing  them  more  and  more  as  they  are.  The 
glory  and  the  wonder  of  life  are  very  near,  but 
one  must  open  one's  eyes.  One  may  not  try  to 
believe  one  thing  and  do  another  thing.  To  have 
a  good  reason,  and  back  of  it  a  real  reason,  is  to 
tangle  up  life  into  a  multitude  of  perfectly  use- 
less knots.  To  be  direct,  to  be  simple, — this  is 
almost  the  complete  formula  of  success. 

403 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

Doubtless,  human  nature  will  some  time  be  a 
much  fairer  thing  than  it  now  is,  but  just  as  it 
is,  human  nature  is  quite  the  most  precious  thing 
that  the  world  has  yet  produced.  It  is  the  one 
element  of  importance  in  the  whole  drama  of 
life,  the  one  element  of  abiding  interest  and 
supreme  moment.  The  moral  outlook  is  full  of 
promise  because  human  nature  is  what  it  is,  —  a 
blunderer,  a  follower  of  false  lights,  a  f orgetter 
of  high  destinies,  it  is  true,  but  nevertheless 
always  seeking,  always  striving,  always  hungry 
for  good  fortune,  always  in  touch  with  a  godlike 
possibiHty.  The  individual  ideal  of  good  fortune 
may  be  small  and  limited.  But  a  man  wants  what 
he  must  want.  In  the  very  act  of  gaining  his 
ideal,  he  discovers  its  quality,  its  limitations,  its 
defects.  Then  he  aspires  again  ;  he  sets  his  heart 
on  something  better.  This  may  happen  many 
times,  nay,  must  so  happen.  But  so  long  as  a 
man  is  faithful,  so  long  as  he  is  sincere,  each 
quest  will  be  a  nearer  approximation  to  what 
is  genuinely  good.  Each  adventure  of  the  spirit 
yields  a  deeper  satisfaction.  And  some  time, 
sooner  or  later,  the  spirit  in  all  sincerity  will 
want  a  fortune  better  than  even  its  own  chastened 
self  can  discern,  a  fortune  that  the  gods  them- 
selves would  call  good.  And  when  this  happens, 
life  has  become  moralized,  and  the  spirit  is  mov- 
ing towards  freedom.    But  the  quest  is  not  over ; 

404 


THE    MORAL   OUTLOOK 


it  has  just  fairly  begun ;  the  quest  itself  is  a  part 
of  the  good  fortune. 

Fate  deals  with  a  man,  not  with  men.  To 
make  religion  this  pressing  personal  problem  for 
every  man  and  woman,  and  boy  and  girl,  is  to 
identify  it  with  life,  and  so  make  it  individual 
and  human.  Disaster  comes  when  a  man  dele- 
gates to  others  what  he  has  no  right  to  alienate 
from  himself,  but  the  disaster  is  a  victory  for  the 
moral  order.  The  way  of  life  is  never  the  way 
from  another's  point  of  view.  We  may  discuss 
life  and  its  possibilities  together,  the  several 
aspects  of  duty,  the  range  of  opportunity,  and 
so  chasten  and  correct  that  partial  view  of  life 
which  alone  is  open  to  the  single  individual,  but 
the  supreme  decision,  what  a  man  ought  to  be 
and  do,  rests  with  him.  It  is  in  the  awful  soli- 
tude of  the  spirit,  in  the  closet-chapel  of  per- 
sonality, that  these  issues  of  life  and  death  must 
be  worked  out,  and  all  larger  decisions  reached. 
When  a  man  takes  firm  hold  of  his  own  life, 
and  handles  it  with  even  the  limited  skill  which 
he  brings  to  the  concerns  of  the  petty,  worka- 
day world,  the  gods  themselves  cannot  deny  him 
heaven. 

We  are  all  children  of  the  same  quest,  seekers 
of  a  good  fortune  such  as  we  see.  For  each  it 
properly  wears  a  different  face.  And  each  is 
bound  by  the  necessity  of  his  own  heart's  desire 

405 


THE    CHILDREN    OF    GOOD    FORTUNE 

to  follow  the  image  which  his  spirit  makes.  But 
when  enlightenment  is  come^  and  the  sweet  rea- 
sonableness of  a  larger  knowledge  abides  in  the 
heart,  this  image  of  good  fortune,  with  its  gentle 
but  unescapable  compulsion,  reveals  itself  as  the 
serene  and  beautiful  face  of  morality. 


Electrotyped  and  printed  by  H.O.  Houghton  df  Co. 
Cambridge,  Mass.,  U.  S.  A. 


JOHN  PERCYFIELD 


By  C  HANFORD  HENDERSON 


"John  Percy  field  is  twisted  of  a  double  thread  — 
delightful,  wise,  sunshiny  talks  on  the  lines  laid 
down  by  the  Autocrat,  and  an  autobiographical  love 
story.  It  is  full  of  wisdom  and  of  beauty,  of  delicate 
delineation,  and  of  inspiring  sentiment." 

New  York  Times, 

"  Its  merits  will  rank  it  among  the  few  sterling 
books  of  the  day."  Boston  Transcript. 

"A  book  of  rare  charm  and  unusual  character  .  .  . 
fresh  and  sweet  in  tone  and  admirably  written 
throughout."  The  Outlook,  New  York. 


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EDUCATION  AND 
THE  LARGER  LIFE 


By  C  HANFORD  HENDERSON 

**In  this  volume  Mr.  Henderson  has  set  down  many 
stimulating  thoughts.  He  makes  inquiry  as  to  how 
education  can  be  so  applied  in  America  as  best  to 
further  the  progress  of  civilization.  .  .  .  Fine  pene- 
tration and  distinct  charm  of  style  make  it  both  in- 
structive and  fascinating." 

Chicago  Record-Herald. 

"  A  broad  minded  view  of  the  relation  of  education 
to  life."  Springfield  Republican. 

"  It  is  a  book  to  come  back  to  again  and  again  for 
hope  and  inspiration."  Life^  New  York. 

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